A Chicago man was sentenced to 18 years in prison for shooting two Venezuelan migrants who were sleeping outside a South Side police station in October 2023, then leading officers on a high-speed chase that ended when he slammed his Jeep Cherokee into a police squad car, injuring four officers. Anthony Evans pleaded guilty to aggravated battery by discharging a firearm and aggravated DUI in the case.
According to CWB Chicago, the shooting happened outside the Grand Crossing (3rd) District station at 7040 South Cottage Grove Avenue, where the two victims had listed the station itself as their home address. A 24-year-old man was struck in the right thigh and a 28-year-old woman was hit in the buttocks. Both were treated and released from University of Chicago Hospital.
The woman was identified as 28-year-old Yerlianny Romero, who had arrived in the United States just one week before the attack, according to Patch. Romero was holding her child on the sidewalk outside the station when shots were fired; she suffered a graze wound while her child was unharmed.
A Station Turned Encampment
The victims were living outside Grand Crossing because Chicago's police stations had become de facto shelters during an acute housing crunch. More than 3,000 asylum seekers were sleeping inside station lobbies and outdoor encampments at the time of the shooting, a crisis that pushed Mayor Brandon Johnson's administration to clear all stations of migrants by December 2023, per WTTW News. Migrants had been arriving on buses chartered by Texas officials since 2022, and by early October 2023 Chicago had received roughly 13,000 of them while recording 1,977 shootings citywide over the same period, according to the Tampa Free Press. Hoodline previously reported on the mayor's $29 million push to build migrant base camps and on residents' lawsuits over housing asylum seekers in public buildings before the stations were finally cleared.
Police spotted a Jeep Cherokee matching the description of the shooting vehicle, and Evans swerved into the southbound lanes of State Street before speeding away northbound, sparking the chase. The pursuit ended when he crashed into a Chicago police tactical unit squad car in the 5400 block of South State Street, injuring four officers who had to be extricated from the damaged vehicle by the Chicago Fire Department.
An Officer's Husband Among the Injured
Among the four officers hurt in the collision was the husband of Illinois State Representative Angelica Guerrero-Cuellar (D-Chicago), according to CBS Chicago. All four were taken to hospitals for treatment. Officers arresting Evans at the crash scene also took three other occupants from inside the Jeep into custody and recovered a second handgun, though no immediate charges were announced against the passengers.
Beside Evans's right hand, officers found a 9-millimeter handgun fitted with an extended magazine and an automatic-fire switch, per the outlet's reporting. Police determined that shell casings from the Jeep and the shooting scene were fired from a 9-millimeter handgun. An open bottle of alcohol was also found inside the vehicle. A doctor at Insight Hospital drew Evans's blood about three hours after the crash, at approximately 6:30 p.m., and it showed a blood alcohol concentration of .175 — more than twice Illinois' legal driving limit.
The Glock Switch Problem
The device found in Evans's vehicle is not a minor accessory under federal law. An auto-sear attachment, commonly called a Glock switch, is legally classified as a machine gun on its own under National Firearms Act regulations, carrying up to 10 years in federal prison regardless of whether it's ever attached to a firearm, according to the ATF. The devices can push a handgun's rate of fire to roughly 1,200 rounds per minute.
Chicago law enforcement recovered nearly 1,200 Glock handguns equipped with illegal auto-sear switches over a two-year period, mirroring a 784 percent national increase in machine gun conversion device recoveries tracked between 2019 and 2023, per Everytown Research & Policy. That proliferation prompted the City of Chicago to sue gun manufacturer Glock in March 2024, alleging the company makes handguns that can be cheaply and easily converted into full-auto weapons, according to WTTW News.
Evans was not supposed to have any firearm at all. He had completed two years of probation following a 2019 conviction for aggravated unlawful use of a weapon in Cook County, meaning he was legally prohibited from possessing a gun at the time of the October 2023 shooting, per CWB Chicago's reporting.
Sentence and Parole Timeline
Judge Shelley Sutker-Dermer handled and sentenced the case, ultimately imposing concurrent sentences of 18 years and five years. Under Illinois' Truth in Sentencing requirements for aggravated battery by discharging a firearm, Evans must serve 85 percent of his 18-year sentence. The Illinois Department of Corrections inmate portal lists his projected parole date as January 25, 2039.
The shooting victims were treated at University of Chicago Hospital, part of the University of Chicago Medical Center campus that houses the South Side's only adult Level 1 trauma center. A 2026 study in JAMA Surgery found the trauma center, established after years of South Side community advocacy, reduced regional firearm mortality by nearly 4% after it opened in May 2018, as Hoodline previously reported. Police have not said whether the migrants outside the station were specifically targeted, and the motive behind the drive-by remains unaddressed in official statements.
