A 25-year-old man and a 64-year-old woman were shot and killed in broad daylight Wednesday on South Pulaski Road in West Garfield Park, in an attack police say unfolded in two adjacent blocks just before noon. Two unknown gunmen approached the man outside in the 200 block of South Pulaski Road around 11:55 a.m. and opened fire, while the woman was found roughly a block away in the 300 block with a gunshot wound to the chest.
Both victims were rushed to Mount Sinai Hospital, where they were pronounced dead, according to police cited by the Chicago Sun-Times. The gunmen fled southbound on Pulaski Road in a black car, and no other injuries were reported in the shooting. Area 4 detectives are investigating the case, though it remains unclear whether the woman was an intended target or was struck amid the chaos of the attack on the man, and the exact relationship between the two victims has not been disclosed.
A Corridor With a Troubled 2026
Wednesday's shooting is not the first burst of gunfire on this stretch of Pulaski Road this year. Back in January, a drive-by shooting in that same 300 block left two 28-year-old men wounded after shots were fired from a passing dark sedan, as Hoodline previously reported. Days later, a daylight shooting in the 700 block of South Pulaski Road left a man dead and prompted a homicide investigation by Area 4 detectives, according to the earlier Hoodline coverage of that case.
In April, a quadruple shooting outside a business near North Pulaski Road and Maypole Avenue killed three people — identified as Rickia Williams, Kenneth Bell Jr. and Lavell Lee — and critically injured a fourth, according to ABC7 Chicago. That attack, along with the January shootings, points to a recurring pattern of daylight ambush-style violence along the Pulaski corridor in West Garfield Park.
A Deadly Stretch of August
The double homicide also lands amid an especially violent August for the neighborhood. CBS Chicago notes that West Garfield Park has recorded multiple fatal shootings this month alone, including a woman killed outside the Original Maxwell Street stand on August 16 and a man fatally shot inside an SUV on July 25. Local violence prevention groups have repeatedly raised concerns about elevated summer gun violence in the area, per the station's reporting.
West Garfield Park is one of four neighborhoods designated as a priority focus area under the City of Chicago's People's Plan for Community Safety, which concentrates street outreach and community violence intervention resources down to specific high-risk blocks. The neighborhood falls under CPD's 11th District (Harrison), headquartered at 3151 W. Harrison St. under Commander Johnny Tate, whose jurisdiction stretches across West Garfield Park, East Garfield Park, Austin, North Lawndale, Humboldt Park and the Near West Side, according to the Chicago Police Department.
Why Mount Sinai and Area 4 Keep Showing Up
Both victims in Wednesday's shooting, like those in January's drive-by, were taken to Mount Sinai Hospital in neighboring North Lawndale, which operates a Level 1 Adult Trauma Center treating roughly 2,000 severe trauma patients a year, according to Rush University Medical Center. Its location near 15th Street and California Avenue makes it the default receiving facility for gunshot victims from Garfield Park.
The investigation falls to CPD's Area 4 Detective Division, which was reorganized in 2020 to cover the 10th, 11th and 15th districts on the West Side, a restructuring meant to improve detective response times and homicide clearance rates, according to the City of Chicago. Before that reorganization, West Side violent crime cases were handled out of detective headquarters located further south or north in the city.
Homicides Persist Even as Other Crime Falls
The Pulaski Road killings arrive against a broader statistical backdrop: a mid-year national crime trends report found that while 10 of 13 reported offense categories declined in Chicago during the first half of 2026 compared with the prior year, homicides citywide rose by 3%, according to the Council on Criminal Justice. The same report found double-digit reductions in robberies and motor vehicle thefts over that span, underscoring a gap between falling property crime and persistent gun homicides in neighborhoods like West Garfield Park.
No arrests had been announced as of Wednesday, and the relationship between the two victims and the motive behind the attack remain open questions for investigators. Area 4 detectives continue to investigate the shooting as the latest entry in a year marked by repeated bloodshed along the same stretch of road.
