S. Samuel
A six-month-old baby's life was brutally cut short this week as a result gang-related gunfire in Chicago.
Details of the horrific Tuesday (March 12) shooting have started circulating online.
Authorities said Tuesday that an attack in which a 6-month-old girl was fatally shot and her father was wounded was apparently gang-related, and that they are searching for the gunman and the driver of the getaway van. Jonylah Watkins was shot five times during the Monday afternoon attack in the South Side neighborhood of Woodlawn. She died Tuesday morning at Comer Children’s Hospital, police said. Her father, Jonathan Watkins, was in serious but stable condition, recovering at Northwestern Memorial Hospital from wounds to his side, buttocks and face, which was only grazed, police said. (News One)
The baby’s father was reportedly the primary target of the unnamed shooter.
Witnesses said the attacker approached Jonathan Watkins around 1 p.m. while he was standing beside his minivan and changing his daughter’s diaper. She was on the front seat. Her family said Jonylah was shot in the thigh, shoulder, lung, liver and bowels. Jonathan Watkins belongs to a gang and has a long criminal history, and Monday’s attack appears to have been gang-related, McCarthy said at a Tuesday news conference. He said police weren’t sure yet whether Watkins will decide to cooperate in the investigation. “No child, certainly not an infant, should be a victim of gang violence,” McCarthy said. (News One)
A couple months ago, Chicago’s Rhymefest talked to SOHH about the violence in his hometown.
“I think especially in black communities, we’re going to learn the election of a Black president doesn’t equal freedom for communities. It doesn’t equal safe communities, especially when you look at the violence in Chicago. I think we’re going to learn if we don’t do things collectively, then there will be no change and there will be no hope. You can get somebody on the court but you need a team around him so he can make a shot.” (SOHH)
Last summer, fellow Chi-Town rapper Lupe Fiasco spoke on the massive murder rate in their neck of the woods.
“I don’t know too much about Rockie Fresh — Chief Keef scares me. Not him specifically, but just the culture that he represents, specifically in Chicago,” Lupe said when asked for his take on Chi-Town newcomers. “And I don’t speak this about any other city because I’m not from there. But like my family lives in Chicago. So my nephews, my cousins, my friends, and my peoples they all in those hoods that he represents. When you drive through Chicago the hoodlums, I don’t want to call Chief Keef a hoodlum, but ‘the’ hoodlums, the gangsters, and the ones you see killing each other — the murder rate in Chicago is skyrocketing and you see who’s doing it and perpetrating it, they all look like Chief Keef.” (#Rap Attack)
