Dec. 17--A 7-year-old boy shot in the back on the West Side was hit by a bullet apparently meant for his older brother standing on a porch not far away, a law enforcement source said Thursday.
The boy was sitting in a car in the 1000 block of North Leamington Avenue around 9:55 p.m. Wednesday when he was shot in the upper back, police said. His mother drove him to West Suburban Medical Center in Oak Park, about a mile and a half away, and he was transferred in serious condition to Lurie Children's Hospital in Chicago.
A source said the boy was alert and talking.
The boy's great-grandmother, Carolyn Lewis, said he was listed in critical but stable condition at Lurie. "He has tubes all in him," she said.
Lewis said she watches the 7-year-old in the afternoons until his mother picks him up. On Wednesday, he had been playing and watching TV before his mother arrived. Lewis said she was asleep when the shooting occurred in front of the home. She said she heard shouting but didn't see what happened.
The law enforcement source said the boy was in the car when someone opened fire several times, apparently aiming at his older brother on the front porch. The car was hit at least twice, and one of the bullets hit the boy in the back, the source said. Police recovered a handful of shell casings.
The source said police were looking into whether the shooting was related to a gang conflict in that part of the Austin community.
Lewis said the children she watches don't stray too far away from the home. "They usually don't go around the neighborhood. They usually stay inside the gate or just outside the gate."
Not long after the shooting, a man in a black jacket walked up with his dog and stared at the police officers working the crime scene. "It's too close to Christmas for this," he said, declining to give his name, saying he feared retaliation.
The man said he heard about five or six gunshots while watching TV with his wife and their four children at home.
"We were all sitting there at the kitchen table. We all heard the shots, and then we just looked at each other like, 'This is exactly why I don't let my kids out at night,' " he said.
No one was in custody Thursday.
