Chicago Gun Violence Claims 101 Victims

Local Editor

At least 101 people were shot in Chicago over the Fourth of July weekend, according to a city newspaper.

Nearly half of the shootings during the four-day holiday happened over 12 hours, reports the Chicago Tribune.

The youngest victim was a 13-year-old boy and the oldest a 60-year-old man.

US President Donald Trump recently said he was sending in federal agents to help local police contain the Illinois city's gang wars.

About half of the shootings happened between 15:30 on Tuesday and 03:30 on Wednesday, mainly in Chicago's south and west sides.

Not even the deployment of more than 1,000 extra officers by Chicago police department could staunch the violence.

The casualties are significantly higher than 2016, when 66 people were shot in Chicago over the Independence Day weekend, which lasted three days.

It brings the total number of people shot in Chicago so far in 2017 to more than 1,800, reports the Tribune.

But that figure is not as severe as last year when 2,035 people had been shot by this point.

At the weekend, Chicago police said shootings this year had declined 14% compared with the first six months of last year.

Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team