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Gang sign exchange leads to shooting in Elmwood Park
Updated: October 28, 2011 12:36PM
An exchange of gang signs resulted in a woman being shot in Elmwood Park early Monday morning.
A 33-year-old Elmwood Park woman was shot at about 3 a.m. at 76th and Fullerton avenues. She is being treated at Gottlieb Memorial Hospital for a gunshot wound to the left thigh.
Elmwood Park Interim Police Chief Frank Fagiano said the incident started on 7100 block of Grand Avenue in Chicago where the woman was driving her Mitsubishi Montero. She had two passengers, a 19-year-old male friend who was in the front passenger seat and her 16-year-old daughter who was in the backseat.
Fagiano said gang signs were exchanged between the male passenger and four men standing on the corner of 71st and Grand Avenues. After the exchange the four men got into a van and followed the woman’s car.
The woman drove south on Harlem at Grand Avenue and then west on Fullerton Avenue. She told police that she drove by the Elmwood Park Police Department with the hopes that the men would stop following her, Fagiano said.
The men continued to pursue her and when they reached 76th and Fullerton Avenues, the van pulled up next to the driver’s side. One of the men slid open the van’s door and shot at the woman’s car. Fagiano said at least two shots were fired, one striking the female driver.
The van fled while the shooting victim turned the car around and headed back to the police station, where she flagged down a police officer. Fagiano said the victim’s injury was not life-threatening.
He said no arrests have been made at this time, but they are following up on several leads. “We feel we have a person of interest,” he said.
