BRIGHTON PARK — Within hours of a Wednesday night gang shooting that left one man dead and four other wounded in the 3700 block of South Western Avenue, neighborhood gang members logged on to social media websites like Facebook to boast about their roles in recent violence and taunt rivals.
In gang-ridden South Side neighborhoods like Brighton Park and Back of the Yards, residents often watch it all unfold on their computer screens and cellphones. Many know shooters by name, but few share information with police.
These residents live by the "no snitch" code of silence, afraid or unwilling to cooperate with police. It's the reason many gang-related murders go unsolved.
"So often we're met with silence," said Ald. Raymond Lopez (15th), who is now calling for scared neighborhood folks to break the silence. "They have information, but they’re unwilling to give it to us out of fear of retaliation."
The latest deadly shooting happened around 6 p.m. Wednesday, when a carload of gang members rolled up on a van filled with a group of their rivals, the Satan's Disciples.
Someone in the car sprayed the van with an assault weapon, killing 18-year-old David Gonzalez and wounding four others, authorities said. The victims who made it to Stroger Hospital alive were 18, 21, 22 and 25.
Investigating the scene, Chicago Police detectives found .223 caliber bullet casings. Their discovery matched the size of ammunition used in a Dec. 16 gang shooting that killed two people and seriously wounded two others in front of a neighborhood market just blocks away.
No one is in custody for Wednesday's shooting, and police are investigating.
Though residents feel unsafe sharing information about neighborhood troublemakers, Lopez said silence caries a high cost and could put the community in even more danger.
"That is not helpful to bringing justice to the community. We need to step up," Lopez said. "We need to speak out and put an end to this. We have to work together to ease some of those fears so the intel will come forward or the violence will continue."
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