Looters in Chicago Ransack and Vandalize Stores After Shooting Incident

CHICAGO, KOMPAS.com - Looters in Chicago vandalized several local businesses in the downtown area early Monday following a police shooting on the city’s South Side.

Vandals smashed storefront windows and ran off with merchandise, cash machines, and anything else they could carry, according to police.

A shooting incident in Chicago happened on Sunday afternoon when a man opened fire on officers, stated Police Superintendent David Brown.

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The shooting prompted a social media post that urged people to form a car caravan and converge on the business and shopping district.

Some 400 additional officers were dispatched to the area after the department spotted the post. Over several hours, police made more than 100 arrests and 13 officers were injured, including one who was struck in the head with a bottle, Brown said.

Brown dismissed any suggestion that the chaos was part of an organized protest of the shooting, calling it “pure criminality" that included occupants of a vehicle opening fire on police who were arresting a man they spotted carrying a cash register.

No officers were wounded by gunfire, but a security guard and a civilian were hospitalized in critical condition after being shot, and five guns were recovered, he said.

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Mayor Lori Lightfoot agreed that the melee had nothing to do with a protest. “This was straight-up felony criminal conduct,” she said. “This was an assault on our city.”

The mayhem brightened the national spotlight that has been on Chicago for weeks after a surge in gun violence that resulted in more homicides in July than any month in decades.

President Donald Trump, who has repeatedly criticized the city's handling of the violence, recently ordered more federal agents to Chicago to take part in what Attorney General William Barr called “classic crime fighting”.

Further ratcheting up the tensions in the city was a video circulating on Facebook that falsely claimed that Chicago police had shot and killed a 15-year-old boy.

Posted at 6:30pm Sunday, the video shows upset residents confronting officers near the scene where police shot and wounded an adult suspect they said had fired at them that day.

By Monday morning, the footage had been watched nearly 100,000 times.