Woman shot outside Macy's store in the Loop, amid large holiday crowds in downtown Chicago
CHICAGO (CBS) -- A woman was wounded in a shooting Saturday night in the Loop outside the Macy's department store on State Street, as large crowds were packing downtown for holiday festivities.
Police said a 19-year-old woman was walking on the sidewalk near the intersection of State and Washington streets shortly before 9 p.m., when an unknown male fired shots.
The victim was taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital in fair condition.
According to unconfirmed police dispatch reports, the victim was shot outside the store, but ran inside Macy's after a report of shots fired near State and Washington streets.
A Chicago Fire Department spokesperson confirmed a second woman was taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital due to a "medical emergency." Unconfirmed police dispatch reports indicated the second woman was standing near the first woman at the time of the shooting, and suffered a panic attack.
The shooting happened as large holiday crowds were gathered downtown for the Magnificent Mile Lights Festival and Parade on Michigan Avenue, as well as the first weekend of the Christkindlmarket in Daley Plaza, just one night after the lighting of the city's official Christmas tree in Millennium Park.
Several people who heard the gunfire a block away at Christkindlmarket ducked behind concrete barricades at Daley Plaza to take cover. Many others ducked into restaurants and other doorways along Washington Street. The shooting happened just as Christkindlmarket was closing, and most visitors had already left Daley Plaza.
"My cousin, she's from Rio de Janeiro, and Rio de Janeiro is known to be a violent city, and she never went through that before, and she came to Chicago to experience that. So it's kind of sad. I've been living in U.S. for 17 years, and when I moved here, this was unthinkable," Francisco Malafaia said.
"All of a sudden there was shootings. Definitely heard lots of fireworks, fire that sound like fireworks. We all got told to lay down, we lay down. We were videoing our friends and telling them to just stay down," another festival goer said.
CBS News Chicago sports anchor Matt Zahn heard gunshots from the station's office on Washington Street, less than a block away from Macy's.
The gunfire was loud and rapid, and the sound of them vibrated the building's windows.
Police officers later could be seen tackling a person to the ground and taking them into custody just outside the CBS News Chicago offices at 22 W. Washington St. However, it appeared police later let that person go, so it was unclear if that person had any connection to the shooting.
Police said no one was in custody. Area 3 detectives were investigating.