No bail for man charged with fatal Near West Side shooting while on electronic monitoring

Ed Rush, 24, has been charged with first-degree murder for Friday’s deadly shooting of 20-year-old Rayveon Hutchins in the 1200 block of South Throop Street. | Carly Behm/Sun-Times

A man charged with fatally shooting a romantic rival on the Near West Side last week had been placed on electronic monitoring just a little over a month before he pulled the trigger, Cook County prosecutors said.

Ed Rush, 24, has been charged with first-degree murder in Friday’s deadly shooting of 20-year-old Rayveon Hutchins in the 1200 block of South Throop Street.

Rush had been on electronic monitoring after being released Oct. 8 on his own recognizance after allegedly battering a police officer and resisting arrest when officers tried to take him into custody on a warrant tied to a separate case, court records show.

Ed Rush

Electronic monitoring records and surveillance footage show that Rush left his home about a block from where Hutchins was gunned down minutes later and that he returned home shortly afterwards, prosecutors said at Rush’s bond hearing Tuesday.

Prosecutors said Rush walked up to Hutchins at 11:59 p.m. Friday and fired at him multiple times with a 9-mm handgun, striking Hutchins in the head, lower back and right hip. A witness who heard the shots saw Rush running from the scene and identified him by name to police, prosecutors said.

Hutchins had recently begun dating the mother of Rush’s child and Rush had previously confronted the woman multiple times about her relationship with Hutchins, prosecutors said. During those confrontations, Rush was allegedly physically abusive, leading the woman to seek an order of protection against him, court records show. The first hearing on the protection order had been previously set for Wednesday, prosecutors said.

On Monday, authorities searched Rush’s home and found a 9-mm handgun that preliminarily matched shell casings found at the murder scene, prosecutors said, as well as a burgundy-colored jacket that the shooter was seen wearing by the witness and on surveillance footage.

An assistant public defender said Rush attends Malcolm X College and has been working intermittently at several jobs as he trains to become a bricklayer. The assistant public defender pointed to multiple “holes” in the prosecution’s case, including the generic description of a burgundy-colored jacket and the possible motivations of the unidentified witness after the shooting.