Man Suspected Of Killing 8 People Outside Chicago Was Related To The Victims
Police say the man suspected of killing eight people in a suburban Chicago neighborhood was related to the majority of the victims
Authorities revealed on Tuesday, the day after a 23-year-old man killed himself during a confrontation with law enforcement in Texas, that the man suspected of shooting and killing eight people in a suburban Chicago neighborhood this weekend was related to the majority of the victims.
“We can't get inside his head,” Joliet Police Chief Bill Evans told reporters. "We just don't have any clue as to why he did what he did.”
According to investigators, Nance opened fire on two men at random on a residential street and one outside an apartment building on Sunday after shooting seven people at two relatives' homes in the city of Joliet, Joliet and Will County officials announced on Tuesday.
Authorities stated that they were still figuring out the victims' precise connections to Nance.
The victims discovered at the Joliet residences were identified by the Will County coroner on Tuesday as Christine Esters, 38, Tamaeka Nance, 47, William Esters II, 35, Joshua Nance, 31, and Alexandria Nance, 20. Two teenage girls, ages 14 and 16, had their names withheld.
Authorities had previously identified Toyosi Bakare, a 28-year-old Nigerian who had been residing in the United States for roughly three years, as the man who was killed outside the apartment building.
Nance fatally shot himself Monday evening after U.S. Marshals located him near Natalia, Texas, about 30 miles southwest of San Antonio and more than 1,000 miles from Joliet, authorities said. He had no known ties to Texas, Illinois authorities confirmed Tuesday.
Nance's death was announced hours after Illinois authorities used social media and a news conference to share initial details of the killings there.
Sheriff Randy Brown of Medina County, Texas, said that his department received a call on Monday regarding a suspect believed to be involved in the Chicago area killings who was traveling into the county via Interstate 35. According to Brown, he thinks the suspect was attempting to travel to Mexico.
“It seems like they (criminal suspects) all head to Mexico,” which is about 120 miles south of Natalia along Interstate 35, Brown said Tuesday
Officers from multiple agencies confronted Nance, Brown said.
Nance may have shot himself, according to Lt. Jason Reyes, a spokesman for the Texas Department of Public Safety, which includes the Texas Rangers, who is leading the investigation into Nance's death.
Reyes said his agency was only called in to conduct an investigation after the fact and that he was unable to provide any more details regarding the events leading up to Nance's death or his run-in with the law. In Texas, the Rangers are often called in to look into deaths involving law enforcement.
According to a database kept up to date by The Associated Press, USA Today, and Northeastern University in collaboration, the shootings in Illinois constitute the fourth mass murder in the United States this year. The third incident occurred on Sunday in Tinley Park, a different suburb of Chicago, and a man has been accused by authorities of killing his wife and three adult daughters.
In a statement on Wednesday, President Joe Biden expressed his sympathies to the victims' families as well as the community, and he urged Congress to consider more gun safety legislation.
“First lady Jill Biden and I are praying for the family members of the eight victims killed in Joliet, Illinois, and for the broader community devastated by these tragic shootings,” the president said. “This tragedy underscores why I am doing everything in my power to keep guns off our streets and out of the hands of those who seek to harm themselves or others.”
He later urged lawmakers “to pass universal background checks and a national red flag law, in addition to other commonsense gun safety measures,” adding: “It is within our power to stop the epidemic of gun violence tearing our communities apart. Congress must act now.”
Authorities informed reporters at a press conference earlier on Monday night that the victims had been discovered on Sunday and Monday at three different residences.
Police were first notified of a man found with an apparent gunshot wound Sunday outside of apartments in Will County and pronounced dead at a hospital, later identified as Bakare. Shortly after, they learned of a man shot in the leg outside a home nearby.
Curtis Ellis said he lives next door to the man wounded in that shooting and captured it on a surveillance camera aimed at their street.
The footage shows the driver of a red car having a brief conversation with Ellis' neighbor before making a U-turn, stopping, and firing nine times. Ellis claimed that he heard gunfire during an NFL playoff game between the Detroit Lions and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, noticed his injured neighbor outside, and called the police.
“That could have been me or my wife in the front yard, which is scary,” Ellis, 56, said. “You haven't done nothing to anybody, why would somebody just target to shoot you?”
According to Will County Chief Deputy Dan Jungles, deputies set up patrols close to the suspected shooter's known addresses and identified the suspect's car late on Sunday using license plate readers and video surveillance. When the car wasn't seen locally by Monday, deputies responded at noon to Nance's last known address, according to the office.
According to Jungles, no one answered at that house, so they went to another house across the street that was associated with Nance and his family and discovered bullet holes on the outside of the building in addition to blood on the door.
The seven people's bodies were discovered by police after forcing their way into both addresses, according to Jungles. Evans told reporters on Tuesday without giving further information that although at one point authorities thought a three-year-old boy was missing, the child was eventually found with a relative in a different city.
“I've been a policeman 29 years and this is probably the worst crime scene I've ever been associated with.” Evans said during a news conference outside the Joliet homes Monday evening.
Nance was apprehended by law enforcement at a gas station in Texas less than two hours after his car was recognized by a helicopter on SH 1-35.
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