There comes a time in every person’s life, where they witness something truly extraordinary. Or in my case, you get shot at and live to tell about it.
It was the evening of the autumnal equinox. My friend Jon and I were set to leave work and take some pictures of the “perfect” downtown sunsets, which some people refer to as the “Chicagohenge“.
We started downtown in The Loop, near the financial district around 5:00 PM, where I wanted to take some street photography of people leaving work. We had until about 6:45 before the sun was going to set. I said that we should head over to the busier part of downtown, toward Michigan Ave.
When we got to the corner of Michigan and Jackson, waiting for the traffic light to change and let us cross with my new Nikon D500 in my hand, we talked about where we were going to set up and which street would be best to catch the sunset.
A fight broke out across the street.
Without even thinking I brought my camera up to my face and started taking pictures.
The young Black guy in red was beating up the young Hispanic man, grabbing him by his shirt and throwing his knees into his chest.
At first the crowd around them was taken aback. They all just stood around and watched them, for what seemed like minutes, but was actually just seconds. I recall a woman screaming at them “You stop that!”.
At this point, the Hispanic guy broke free and started to run south into Jackson street. Red Shirt ran up behind him, kicking Pajama Pants between his legs from behind, causing him to fall down.
Red Shirt started wailing on Pajama Pants some more, who appeared to be cradling something.
“I think that guy has a gun?”
My friend Jon said to me “I think that guy has a gun?”
I lowered my camera to see if he was talking about someone else. Then I raised my camera and looked at them again and said “Nah, I don’t think so man.” I lowered the camera one more time and talked to him about something else and he said “That guy definitely has a gun. That’s a gun!”
Right then, I turned around to look at them, they had migrated back towards the corner they were originally fighting. The Black guy in the red shirt started running into the middle of Michigan Ave, towards me and Jon. The Hispanic guy pulled out a gun from the previously clutched fanny pack he was guarding.
Brazen and recklessly, he took a combat stance, aimed at the Red Shirt guy and took a single shot.
Pure instinct took over for the entire crowd. We all ducked and took cover almost immediately. A few people screamed. Jon and I took cover around the South corner of the building we next to. Once around the corner, I stopped against the wall and peeked my head back out to see if anyone was hurt and to see where the shooter went.
My mind flashing dozens of thoughts a second. Should I try to get more pictures? Was anyone hurt? Am I in danger? Am I shot? Was Jon shot?
“What are you doing!?“, Jon called out to me. I saw the Black guy pop up from behind a small concrete wall that separated Michigan Ave. Red Shirt stood there for a second, as if to asses if he’d been shot, by moving his hands over his body. He audibly sighed, then hopped over the wall that was closest to us and started walking towards me and Jon.
“We need to go.” Jon said, sternly. “Yeah, you’re right. Let’s get the fuck out of here.”
We headed West and ducked into the lobby of the building we were taking cover against. Once inside, we saw people were getting ready to walk out. Jon and I started calling out “Don’t go outside just yet. Someone just fired a gun at someone.” People seemed bewildered. Some ignored us. “What? A gunshot? Downtown!?” Yup. That’s right.
I proceeded around a structure in the lobby to find the front desk, where I told the guy behind the counter that he should call security, informing him about the shooting and a potential shooter on the loose. I showed him pictures of the shooter and explained that he might try to run into this building to hide, and asked to help keep people safe.
I walked back to the lobby to Jon. He extended his arm out to me. He looked at his hand and then back to me. “I’m shaking” he said. I smiled, feeling thankful we were okay, and raised my arm. My hand was shaking, too.
I looked out the glass doors on the South side of the building (adjacent to Jackson Ave) and noticed Red Shirt was calmly walking West down Jackson street. His demeanor seemed as if he was slightly inconvenienced and was now going on about his day. Suspecting that Red Shirt might’ve seen me take pictures of him, Jon and I agreed to walk back through the lobby and exit the East doors on Michigan Ave.
Before we exited the doors, Jon suggested that maybe we should wait for the cops to get here. Just as he said that, multiple sirens could be heard. Cop cars came in from all directions. It was amazing how fast they responded.
“You should probably go talk to the police and show them your pictures.” Jon said.
My mind stammered – I hadn’t thought of it. My mind was still racing. “Good idea”, I responded.
We went outside and I saw a police SUV parked near the corner of the street in front of a small cafe called “Corner Bakery”. It looked like the cop was about to pull away, when I shouted out “Hey, hey, hey! Wait! I have pictures!” He slowed to a stop and parked his car. He said “Stay right there. Let me come to you.” He got out of his car and said “You have pictures? May I see them?”
I began to show him all of the photos on my camera’s LCD screen and pointed out that the Hispanic guy in the blue pajama bottoms was the shooter.
Just like that, I became the largest pot of honey on the sidewalk. Everyone wanted to see them – gawkers, eye witnesses, and every police officer who arrived on the scene. I must’ve shown those pictures over 50 times.
I remember seeing a man there, who some people on the internet refer to as a “Boot” – someone who’s enamored with military or police culture, but doesn’t have the qualifications to be in the military or a police unit. He stood around and acted as if he was a crime scene investigator and would parrot everything witnesses would say. He’d sometimes sprinkle police or legal jargon in the mix with an “affirmative” or “allegedly”.
After I had shown these pictures to at least a dozen cops, who were very quickly organized to execute a search party, within minutes I heard on their police radios from the cops standing next to us “We’ve picked up a suspect.”
“Did you guys already get him? Yeah, CPD!” I joyfully shouted in my best Jessie Pinkman impression. (Yeah, CPD! Yeah, cameras!)
As people had gathered around us someone pointed out the bullet hole in the glass. An old lady started screaming out at anyone who would listen “I was about to sit down in that chair [in front of the bullet hole] and have my smoke break! Had I sat down 1 second before, I would’ve been shot in my hip!”
It was at this moment that the gunshot, and the danger we were all in, became hyper-real. The bullet had traveled through rush hour traffic, missed every car and bus in every lane, missed every person, and hit the glass of this window, and missed everyone who was working behind the counter of the Corner Bakery.
Then the Commanding Officer (“C.O.”) came over and said, in a very polite and “legal” tone, “We have picked up someone who may or may not have been involved. Would you like to help us with identifying this person?” Of course. Myself, Jon, and The Boot headed inside the Corner Bakery. We waited about a minute for the police car to bring around the suspect.
Meanwhile I was trying to fiddle with my new camera to try and send the photos from my camera to my phone, so I could email them to the Chicago Police. Apparently I set my camera to save photos as “RAW – uncompressed RBG” which meant they were being saved as “TIFF” files, and couldn’t be transferred with Nikon’s mobile app. Odd. I told the officers that if they gave me an email address, I’ll send them over. One of the female officers gave me her address. I promised that I would send them when I got home that night.
The police car arrived and they pulled the suspect out. Yup, that’s him alright. They nabbed him.
I answered a few more questions and then was told I was good to go. “Some detectives will be in touch with you soon.” Boy, were they right, as detectives started calling me that night and the following day, asking if I’d be willing to come into the police station and give an official statement.
Now that we were free to go, Jon and I went to take some pictures of the Chicagohenge. Unfortunately, the conditions for the shoot weren’t optimal, as there were some clouds that diffused the light, and the crowd we took pictures next to were all holding up their phones, which limited our ability to take shots.
Afterwards Jon and I went to a rooftop bar and bought each other a round of drinks to reflect on what happened. We made friends with some people who were in town for some job training. Jon and I were putting on faces. We were still experiencing effects of traumatic shock, but weren’t interested in talking about the shooting. After our drinks were done, we headed home. He had a Bears game to watch with his friends and I wanted to go home and relax.
Once I got home, I set down my stuff and hugged my dogs. My girlfriend was in her office doing something on the web. I told her “I’m OK. Everyone’s OK. But Jon and I were shot at after work.” and began to go through my day.
Who is the shooter and what did he do?
When I talked to one of the detectives the next day, he said “Boy, I tell ya, we’ve never seen photos this good. The entire department has looked at these and all exclaimed just how impressed they were with these photos you got.”
The following day Jon and I went to give our statements. A detective picked us up around 6 o’clock and took us to the police station on around 47th street. When we got there and sat down, we were taken through multiple hallways, up an elevator, and down another hallway where there was a row of chairs for visitors to sit.
The inside of the department looked like the walls hadn’t been painted in almost 10 years. Each corner had visible scars from officers’ handguns, flashlights, or handcuffs (etc) hanging on them. The chairs were opposite from a sort of receptionist desk that had multiple file baskets, including outgoing mail, inventory reports, and notices to employees saying to “do this” or “don’t mail out private information”.
There were also multiple religious cut-outs taped to the side of the wall. Stuff like “Go with God and he will protect you”. I was a bit surprised to see a city-funded place with religious stuff on a wall.
When we sat down, we were introduced to another witness who also agreed to come in. She was absolutely lovely.
As we all sat around waiting for the state attorney to come down and take our statements, we shared stories and got to know each other for a while. We told jokes and shared TV shows we were recently watching. The detectives couldn’t have been more nice. They constantly checked on us, asking if they could run out and get us some dinner or get us some snacks, etc. We were all modest and asked for candy or some chips/crisps.
After about 7 hours, and multiple statements later, we were done and ready to be driven home. We were exhausted. Our new lady friend, who was being driven home by another detective, was walking past us, back towards the elevator. She stopped and turned back to us. It looked like she was holding back some tears.
“Are you OK?” I asked her. “Yes. I’m just sad because I’m not sure if I’ll ever see you guys again.” I said “Look us up! You know our full names now and where we work!” It was really sweet to make a friend that day, out of all of this chaos.
After all that has been said and done, I do hope that she remains friends with us. Something good has to come from this.