3 children in car uninjured after driver is fatally shot and crashes in Little Village

The children — 3, 6 and 8 — and the man were stopped at a red light on Cermak Road Wednesday morning when a vehicle pulled up and three people inside opened fire, police said.

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Chicago Fire Department ambulance.

Sun-Times file

Three young children were uninjured after gunmen opened fire into their car and killed the driver, causing him to crash into a Little Village cellphone store Wednesday morning.

The children — 3, 6 and 8 — and the man were stopped at a red light in the 2300 block of West Cermak Road at 5:35 a.m. when a dark-colored vehicle pulled up and three people inside opened fire, Chicago police said.

Christian Ruiz, 30, was shot in his chest and crashed into T-Mobile store at Cermak and Western Avenue as he tried to drive away, according to the Cook County medical examiner’s office.

He was taken to Mount Sinai Hospital and pronounced dead, police said. The children inside the car were uninjured.

Police said no one was in custody.

Also Wednesday morning, several people were hurt in a serious crash about three miles south in Gage Park. Paramedics took five people to hospitals — two of them in serious condition — after a four-vehicle crash at 51st Street and Western Avenue, according to the Chicago Fire Department.

It wasn’t immediately clear what caused the crash.

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