LOGAN SQUARE — Shots were fired early Sunday at the busy intersection of Logan Boulevard and Milwaukee Avenue as some farmers market vendors were setting up their booths, according to police and witnesses.
No one was injured, they said.
Officers arrived in the 2600 block of North Milwaukee Avenue — feet away from the farmers market — at 7:43 a.m. to find shell casings but no one shot, according to Officer Michael Carroll, a Chicago Police Department spokesman.
Liz Swartz, 36, was walking to the Logan Square Blue Line station when she saw several police cars blocking off Milwaukee Avenue from Logan Boulevard to Kedzie Avenue.
Swartz didn't hear the shots, but spoke to a witness at the scene who told her people in passing cars exchanged gunfire. Police couldn't immediately confirm this account.
While the farmers market doesn't open until 10 a.m., Swartz said some vendors were out setting up as police secured the scene.
"There was at least one or two of the [farmers market] booths right by there setting up — the fruit stand up at the top there ... I remember seeing the sunflowers being put out," Swartz said.
It's the first time in the market's 12-year history that violence has happened so close according to longtime Logan Square Chamber of Commerce executive director Paul Levin, who has been involved in putting on the market since it started.
"I just am stunned that people could be so irresponsible or out of touch with reality to be doing that kind of stuff anywhere in a middle of a neighborhood, particularly at 7:45 a.m. on a Sunday morning," Levin said. "I'm just dumbfounded."
Levin, who was running errands elsewhere when the shooting occurred, praised the police for what he deemed to be a quick response.
"The police response, from what I could see, was very fast," he said, adding that he saw at least a dozen squad cars when he arrived on the scene.
Not long after the shooting, "multiple" cars were involved in a car crash at Armitage and Kedzie avenues. Police believe the two incidents are related, but didn't immediately provide details.
A 26-year-old woman was injured in the crash and transported to Norwegian Hospital, where she was listed in good condition, Carroll said.
As of Monday afternoon, no one was in custody for either incident.
Swartz, who has lived in the neighborhood with her husband for eight years, was struck by the time and the location of the shooting.
"You constantly see joggers out at that hour by themselves. It's very disconcerting," Swartz said of the intersection.
"It's not something you expect to happen, but this is something that families and people in a lot of parts of Chicago are dealing with every day, so I think we need to be vigilant."
