Community calls for peace after spate of mass shootings in Chicago

Chicago Tribune

20 hours ago

As the Fourth of July holiday weekend drew to a close, several dozen people gathered Sunday for a rally and march in River North to decry a recent spate of mass shootings, including one that left four dead and 14 wounded last week.
About 40 people attended the rally in Washington Square Park, where organizers urged support for victims of gunfire and their families.
'Too many of us know the pain and grief that comes from our loved ones being taken from this Earth or harmed,' Whitney Jean, of the Black Youth Project 100, told attendees. 'We want to extend our love to the Artis community, Mello (Buckzz) and those that are closest to this tragedy.'
The city has recorded at least three mass shootings in the last week: One in River North, another in Riverdale and a third over the weekend in the Back of the Yards, according to CPD.
'What happened in Chicago these past couple weeks has been crazy, to say the least,' Alvin Anthony, a field organizer with Chicago Votes, which hosted the rally, told those gathered. 'We're supposed to be coming together, enjoying the holiday … We have folks out killing each other.'
'We need to come together and hold our own selves accountable,' Anthony added. 'I feel like, in our community, we need to stop glorifying violence.'
After the rally, the group marched about a mile through River North. A prayer and moment of silence were held at the corner of Chicago Avenue and Wells Street, about a block east from where one of the largest shootings in recent memory unfolded late last Thursday.
Around 11 p.m. that night, bursts of gunfire claimed four lives and left 14 other people injured as they stood on the sidewalk in the 300 block of West Chicago Avenue.
Attendees had gathered to celebrate the release of an album by Chicago drill rapper Mello Buckzz, whose legal name is Melanie Doyle. The medical examiner's office last week identified the four dead as Leon Andrew Henry, 25, Devonte Williamson, 23, Aviance King, 27, and Taylor Walker, 26.
The victims were shot as they stood outside the venue — the recently opened restaurant and community space Artis — which was rented out for the party.
The shooting was among the city's worst in recent years and served as a warning that even though violent crime has fallen in recent years, gun violence — especially that fueled by rivalries on Chicago's splintered gang landscape — remains stubbornly persistent.
'Shootings like these are a tragic reminder of how far we still have to go as a city,' Mayor Brandon Johnson said during a news conference last Thursday, calling the incident a cowardly 'act of hate.'
City and state officials decried the mass shooting while calling it an isolated incident and asking citizens to send in information to investigators. Deputy Mayor for Public Safety Garien Gatewood said none of the victims are residents of the River North neighborhood.
For the past 15 years, Chicago's drill rap scene has often been linked to fatal gun violence as rival artists with reputed gang ties trade insults and threats through their lyrics and social media taunts.
Police officials did not offer a motive, citing the pending investigation, but said it was clear that the venue was targeted.
'This wasn't some random shooting where someone just decided that they were going to shoot at this particular group of people,' CPD Superintendent Larry Snelling said last week. 'Obviously, there's a motive there.'
On her Facebook page — followed by almost 100,000 people — Mello Buckzz appears to claim affiliation with the NLMB, a gang faction with territory in the South Shore neighborhood that's been linked to several murders in recent years. Among the most high-profile NLMB associates is Chicago drill rapper G Herbo, who collaborated with Mello Buckzz in a song released in 2024.
Members and associates of the NLMB — an acronym for 'No Limit Muskegon Boyz' and 'Never Leave My Brothers' — were previously linked to another quadruple murder in the South Shore in 2017 and another brazen daytime slaying in a South Loop barbershop in 2021.
The group was also tied to a 2021 mass shooting at a rented retail store in the Ashburn neighborhood, according to police sources. Two gunmen opened fire on attendees of a birthday party, leaving one man dead and seven other people injured.
Earlier this year, Doyle was sentenced to probation for allegedly attacking a woman over what her lawyer in court documents described as 'diss threats' from the complaining witness.