DOWNTOWN — A Chicago man has been charged in connection to the killing of two teenagers outdoors their Downtown constitution faculty virtually a yr to the date that the capturing shook the town.
Cook dinner County prosecutors charged Tommie Coleman, 22, on Friday with two counts of first-degree homicide, one cost of tried first-degree homicide and two different gun-related felonies, police mentioned.
A warrant for Coleman’s arrest on homicide prices was issued early final month, based on county court docket information. He’s additionally charged with fleeing the state as a fugitive, police mentioned.
Within the early afternoon of Jan. 26, 2024, two college students at Improvements Excessive College — 17 and 16 years previous, respectively — have been leaving the constitution faculty Downtown high-rise location at 17 N. State St., when six individuals between two vehicles stepped out and fired pictures, police mentioned on the time.
Two boys have been shot within the chest and later declared useless at a close-by hospital. CBS Information recognized the deceased as Monterio Williams, 17, and Robert Boston, 16. A lady strolling Downtown had her jacket grazed by a bullet, and a close by vendor instructed the Solar-Occasions he heard “at the least 20 to 30 rounds.”
4 of the attackers fled the scene in a automotive, whereas two others ran off on foot earlier than going into a close-by Popeye’s and altering garments, based on the Solar-Occasions.
Coleman, whom police recognized as dwelling within the Pullman neighborhood, is the primary individual to face prices within the case.
He was arrested Wednesday within the metropolis’s Jefferson Park neighborhood by Chicago police working with the U.S. Marshals Nice Lakes Regional Activity Power, police mentioned. Coleman is anticipated to seem for a pretrial detention listening to Saturday.
Coleman can be wished on a misdemeanor cost in July for legal trespassing in suburban Schaumburg, based on court docket information.
The capturing at Improvements, a small constitution faculty designed to assist college students who dropped out or had truancy points at different faculties, happened in a yr that noticed a number of shootings concentrating on college students at their faculties as a part of a grim multi-year pattern.
Maurice Clay, 18, was killed that very same week outdoors CICS Loomis-Longwood, 1309 W. ninety fifth St., the Solar-Occasions reported. A North Lawndale School Prep pupil was shot in November 2023 whereas he was strolling to highschool.
A WBEZ/Solar-Occasions evaluation discovered that shootings close to faculties spiked in 2022. A Chalkbeat evaluation confirmed greater than 50 school-aged kids have been fatally shot within the metropolis in 2021. That included two 15-year-old Simeon Profession Academy college students killed minutes aside on the South Facet in September 2021: Jamari Williams, a sophomore, and Kentrell McNeal, a freshman.
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