A 17-year-old girl was among five people wounded — four of them critically — in a shooting that happened just outside Lincoln Park Zoo early Saturday.
A group of people were gathered outside in the 1900 block of North Stockton Drive when an argument broke out before someone pulled out a gun and fired shots around 4:40 a.m., according to Chicago police.
The 17-year-old girl was shot in the buttocks and taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital in good condition, police said.
Three men who suffered multiple gunshot wounds — ages 27, 31 and 44 — took themselves to the same hospital, where all were listed in critical condition, police said.
A fourth man, 23, also suffered multiple gunshot wounds in the attack. He showed up at Illinois Masonic Medical Center in critical condition, police said.
No arrests were reported.
By mid-morning, there were no signs that a mass shooting had taken place several hours earlier, as residents strolled into the zoo and a farmer’s market along the rolling drive that cuts through Lincoln Park.
In a written statement, Ald. Timmy Knudsen (43rd) and North Side state Rep. Margaret Croke said the group who were gathered when the gunfire broke out were “engaged in reckless behavior” and “had been drinking.”
The elected officials said police vowed to “consistently patrol” the area and reinstate parking restrictions in “strategic places” near where the shooting occurred.
“Let us be clear: this type of violence is unacceptable in our city and as elected officials, we will work to ensure there is a rapid response to deter this from happening again,” Knudsen and Croke said.
Felicia Wilhelm, who has lived near that stretch of Stockton Drive for decades, walked her poodle Charlie past the scene of the shooting later Saturday morning. She welcomed the prospect of increased patrols.
“I don’t know if it’ll make much of a difference,” Wilhelm said of potential parking bans. “[Patrols] are the thing that gives people the most confidence. It’s a deterrent, and if it does that, those people will go somewhere else.”
Anyone with video or information on the shooting was asked to contact Area 3 detectives at (312) 744-8263.
