A 31-year-old man was left in critical condition early Thursday after someone opened fire on a sidewalk in Hyde Park, along the 5400 block of South Cornell Avenue. Officers arrived to find him unresponsive with a gunshot wound to the chest, and paramedics rushed him to the University of Chicago Medical Center, where he remained in critical condition. The pre-dawn shooting rattled the normally quiet stretch as detectives fanned out in search of the shooter.
According to the Chicago Sun-Times, police found the man around 4:50 a.m. on the sidewalk in the 5400 block of South Cornell Avenue with a chest wound. He was taken to the University of Chicago Medical Center and listed in critical condition, police said, while Area One detectives canvassed the scene for witnesses and surveillance video.
Where this fits in the city's numbers
Chicago has seen shootings tick up this year compared with last year’s historic lows, with Chicago Police Department data showing an increase in shooting victims and homicides through the first third of 2026, WTTW reported. The trend has kept law-enforcement attention trained on South Side neighborhoods even as the city’s overall totals remain below levels seen in past decades.
Police response and next steps
Police have asked anyone with information or relevant footage to contact Area One detectives. As of the Chicago Sun-Times report, no arrests had been announced. Detectives said they would continue working leads from their canvass and reviewing any nearby surveillance video in an effort to track down whoever pulled the trigger.
