CHICAGO — Anti-violence advocates are calling for the return of ShotSpotter, the city’s ShotSpotter gunshot detection technology, following several deadly shootings.
Friends and family members of 19-year-old Sierra Evans gathered for a vigil on Wednesday evening near the spot where her body was found early Saturday morning, near East 95th Street and South Avenue North in the East Side neighborhood.
“She was so kind-hearted. Sierra never crossed nobody, did nothing wrong to nobody. This was uncalled for and this is why they should have never taken the ShotSpotters off. My friend was found in an alley later,” Evans’ friend Timia Garrett said.
Evans was found over nine hours after she had been shot.
Saturday’s deadly shooting was just one of several incidents with a delayed police response since the city’s ShotSpotter contract ended on Sept. 23.
Just before midnight on Tuesday, Chicago police reported that a man was discovered on a sidewalk in the 3300 block of West Cermak after he was shot several times. He later died from his injuries.
A majority of city council members supported keeping ShotSpotter, but Mayor Johnson has pledged to veto an ordinance passed two weeks ago that would give CPD Superintendent Larry Snelling authority over the contract.
Johnson said the city is looking for alternatives, but some aldermen fear the gap in service could be lengthy and are calling for the system to be reactivated.
“It’s clear where I stand on ShotSpotter. I was an advocate for it,” Ald. Peter Chico (10th Ward) said.
Chico said after the shooting, he contacted ShotSpotter’s parent company SoundThinking who informed him that 10 shots were fired and picked up on the system from two different sensors near the area.
“I contacted sound thinking to get shots fired audio and calls and they had reported 10 shots in the vicinity,” Chico said.
On Tuesday, Evans’ family and city leaders spoke out about a death they felt could have been avoided had ShotSpotter still been active at the scene of her murder.
Evans’ family also called for more police presence and license plate readers in the neighborhood, as well as access to mental health services.
“It’s a comprehensive approach. If it was one thing, one answer, then I guess you could hire a dictator. But I’m glad that we have a democracy that recognizes that in order to build a better, stronger, safer Chicago you have to have affordable housing, you have to reliable safe transportation, you have to invest in young people,” Mayor Johnson said.
A city council meeting, where the ShotSpotter ordinance is expected to be on the agenda, is scheduled to take place next week and the mayor could take veto action beforehand.