Six dead in shooting at Chicago July 4 parade
Empty chairs sit along the sidewalk after parade-goers fled Highland Park's Fourth of July parade after shots were fired, Monday, July 4, 2022 in Chicago. (Tyler Pasciak LaRiviere/Chicago Sun-Times via AP)
At least six people died and 24 were wounded in a shooting at a July Fourth parade in a Chicago suburb and officers are searching for a suspect who fired on the festivities from a rooftop, police said on Monday.
Highland Park police commander Chris O’Neill, the incident commander at the scene, urged people to shelter in place as authorities search for the suspect, described as a white man wearing a white or blue T-shirt.
Hours after the shooting, with bystanders and media standing nearby, about a dozen officers suddenly dashed for a small office building near where the shooting occurred.
They crouched at the glass doors, before flinging them open and rushing in, rifles pointed inside into a dark foyer. It was not immediately clear why the police had entered the building.
Lake County major crime taskforce spokesman Christopher Covelli said at a news conference that the gunman apparently opened fire on parade-goers from a rooftop using a rifle that was recovered at the scene.
Mr Covelli said police believe there was only one gunman and warned that he should still be considered armed and dangerous.
Police have not released any details about the victims or wounded.
Mayor Nancy Rotering said: “This morning at 10.14 our community was terrorised by an act of violence that has shaken us to our core.
“Our hearts go out to the families of the victims at this devastating time.
“On a day that we came together to celebrate community and freedom, we are instead mourning the tragic loss of life and struggling with the terror that was brought upon us.”
The parade began at about 10am local time, but it was suddenly halted about 10 minutes later after shots were fired.
Hundreds of parade-goers, some visibly bloodied, fled the parade route, leaving behind chairs, pushchairs, bicycles and blankets.
Police told people: “Everybody disperse, please. It is not safe to be here.”
Highland Park Police initially said in a statement that five people had been killed and 19 people were taken to hospital, but those numbers were revised soon after at the news conference.
Video shot by a Sun-Times journalist after the gunfire rang out shows a band on a float continuing to play as people run past, screaming.
Gina Troiani and her son were lined up with his daycare class ready to walk on to the parade route when she heard a loud sound that she believed was fireworks, until she heard people shouting about a gunman.
“We just start running in the opposite direction,” she told The Associated Press.
Her five-year-old son was riding his bike decorated with red and blue curled ribbons. He and other children in the group held small American flags. The city said on its website that the festivities were to include a children’s bike and pet parade.
Ms Troiani said she pushed her son’s bike, running through the area to get back to their car.
In a video that she shot on her phone, some of the children are visibly startled at the loud noise and they scramble to the side of the road as a siren wails nearby.
“It was just sort of chaos,” she said. “There were people that got separated from their families, looking for them. Others just dropped their wagons, grabbed their kids and started running.”
Illinois governor J.B. Pritzker said in a tweet that he is “closely monitoring the situation in Highland Park” and that Illinois state police are assisting.
Debbie Glickman, a Highland Park resident, said she was on a parade float with co-workers and the group was preparing to turn on to the main route when she saw people running from the area.
“People started saying ‘There’s a shooter, there’s a shooter, there’s a shooter’,” Glickman told the Associated Press.
“So we just ran. We just ran. It’s like mass chaos down there.” “I’m so freaked out,” she said. “It’s just so sad.”
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