Man shot on CTA platform in downtown Chicago
CHICAGO (CBS) — A man was critically wounded in a shooting at Loop CTA 'L' stop in broad daylight Tuesday morning.
It was not clear late Tuesday what led up to the Christmas Eve shooting. But the incident left riders feeling uneasy.
The 45-year-old was at the Clark/Lake elevated stop when a man fired shots in his direction around 9:40 a.m. A bystander told police the man was standing inside a train when it happened.
The victim was shot three times and taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital in critical condition.
Police said the victim knew the shooter.
Cellphone video shows officers standing on the platform, standing next to what looked like shell casings.
The elevated Clark/Lake station serves the Pink, Green, Brown, Orange, and Purple lines, with Blue Line trains in the subway below.
Trains did not stop at the elevated station while police investigated.
At the time of the shooting, construction worker Ron Reid was working right across the street on the Thompson Center, which is currently undergoing a gut renovation as it is transformed from a state office building to a Chicago headquarters for Google.
"I was on site. We're working all the way at the top in between the wall—and I thought I heard something, but you know, it's a construction site," Reid said. "So I'm thinking it's a site noise, but I don't know like if this is what I was hearing, but I heard, it was a repetitive sound."
The repetitive sound was gunshots—a reality that has been seen and reported on all too often and keeps riders' heads on a swivel.
"It's a little hair-raising because you're kind of on your own on the train. There's not a lot of transit detail," said CTA rider Deepak Tamasker. "There's not a lot of police. There's not anyone of that nature looking out for people on a car-by-car basis. So you know, unfortunately, you kind of keep to yourself and keep your eyes open and hope for the best."
This shooting also happened at a time when safety and violence on mass transit are the subject of a national discussion—particularly after a man was arrested and charged with setting a woman on fire and killing her on the New York City subway in Brooklyn this past weekend.
In the Loop 'L' shooting Tuesday morning, no one was in custody as of late in the day.
