3 shot outside of Cook County JailJermaine Nolenon July 11, 2021 at 3:33 am

Three people were wounded in a shooting Saturday night outside of Cook County Jail in Little Village.

The shooting happened about 8:55 p.m. near 27th Street and California Boulevard, according to preliminary information from Chicago police.

Additional information about the victims hasn’t been released.

Officers combed California Boulevard in a light rain for evidence and placed nearly a dozen markers in the street in front of an area of the jail where visitors can enter.

A woman who had gone to the jail complex to try to see a detainee said she heard what she thought was fireworks going off as she talked with another visitor at the entrance to a parking lot in the 2800 block of West California Boulevard.

“We were talking from car-to-car and I looked at her and said, ‘those sounded really close,” she told the Sun-Times. “Moments later, I heard two pops in front of the visiting area, then more in a cadence that couldn’t be anything but gunshots.”

The woman, who asked her name not be used, said they ducked inside their vehicles and waited for the shots to end.

“When the shooting stopped, a Cook Country [sheriff’s officer] said to me, ‘young lady, I think you better move your car,’ and at first I laughed it off because I didn’t believe him, but he was serious and told me those were gunshots.

“I can’t stop thinking to myself that had I not stopped to talk to my friend, I could have been in that area when they were shooting. I was supposed to be over there,” she said.

Read More