(Writer's Note: The number for this past weekend's shootings have been updated to reflect developments in some of the incidents.)
It doesn’t matter what ANY member of the media, ANY politician, ANY celebrity or ANY athlete says about the riots that have ravaged the country following the tragic death of George Floyd last week. I don’t hear ANY of them crying over the record number of people who were just killed in the most violent weekend of 2020 in Chicago. Until ANY of them do, their words fall on deaf ears.
Sadly, an astonishing 24 people were murdered over the weekend and at least 61 others were wounded in shootings across the Chicagoland area. What’s even more sad is that this past weekend’s shootings make the previous weekend pale by comparison.
The previous weekend was the deadliest Memorial Day weekend since 2015. At least 10 people were killed and another 38 people were wounded. This past weekend’s shootings represent a 70 percent increase over Memorial Day weekend.
The Chicago Sun-Times reported that “more than half of the weekend’s victims were shot on Sunday.”
Here are the names and ages of those who were killed over the weekend (Note: The details of some of the victims have yet to be released by the Cook County medical examiner’s office):
Angelo Bronson, 36
Fernando De Leon, 34
Noel Dominguez, 26
David L. Green, 39
Gregory A. Lewis, 21
Danyal P. Jones, 30
Deonte Fleming, 23
Was that list long enough for people who claim to care about minority communities? Or will we continue to hear silence about these killings because it doesn’t fit a ready-made narrative?
As for MRCTV’s running tally of weekend shootings victims in Chicago, the count is now up to 102 people killed with at least another 492 people wounded. It’s been a hectic last week and weekend, so the Chicago Tribune hasn’t update their total count of shooting victims for the entirety of 2020. For now the number remains at 1,003 shooting victims, as of May 26. That number is 128 victims ahead of 2019’s pace.
Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot has placed a curfew for residents in the city. But much like when it comes to firearms, criminals don’t pay attention to the law. With the Chicago Police Department (CPD) possibly overwhelmed with all of the rioting and looting going on, Chicago criminals have seemingly taken advantage by ramping up their usual actions.
Whatever the case might be, it doesn’t seem like very many people care about the names listed above.