A Chicago man was sentenced to 18 years in prison for murdering two Venezuelan migrants who were sleeping outside a South Side police station in October 2023, then led cops on a high-speed chase that culminated with him crashing his Jeep Cherokee into a police squad car, wounding four officers. Anthony Evans pled guilty to aggravated violence with a firearm and aggravated DUI in the case.
According to CWB Chicago, the incident occurred outside the Grand Crossing (3rd) District station at 7040 South Cottage Grove Avenue, where both victims listed the station as their home address. A 24-year-old guy was wounded in the right thigh, while a 28-year-old lady was hit in the buttocks. Both were treated and released from the University of Chicago Hospital.
The woman was identified as 28-year-old Yerlianny Romero, who had only arrived in the United States one week before the attack, according to Patch. Romero was holding her infant on the pavement outside the station when shots were fired; she received a graze wound, but her child was unhurt.
The victims were residing outside of Grand Crossing because Chicago police stations had become de facto shelters during a severe housing crisis. More than 3,000 asylum seekers were sleeping in station lobbies and outside encampments at the time of the incident, prompting Mayor Brandon Johnson’s administration to remove all stations of migrants by December 2023, according to WTTW News. Since 2022, migrants have been arriving on busses sponsored by Texas officials, and by early October 2023, Chicago had received approximately 13,000 of them, while the city has recorded 1,977 shootings during the same time period, according to the Tampa Free Press. Hoodline has reported on the mayor’s $29 million campaign to create migrant base camps, as well as complaints filed by neighbors over lodging asylum seekers in public buildings before the stations were vacated.
Police noticed a Jeep Cherokee that matched the description of the shooting vehicle, and Evans drove into the southbound lanes of State Street before driving away northbound, initiating the chase. The pursuit ended when he collided with 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 wrecked vehicle by Chicago Fire Department personnel.
According to CBS Chicago, one of the four officers injured in the collision was the husband of Illinois State Representative Angelica Guerrero-Cuellar (D-Chicago). All four were transferred to hospitals for treatment. Officers arrested Evans at the scene and detained three other occupants of the Jeep, as well as recovering a second weapon, though no charges were filed against the passengers.
Officers discovered a 9-millimeter handgun with an extended magazine and an automatic-fire switch near Evans’ right hand, according to the outlet. Police discovered that the shot shells from the Jeep and the crime site were discharged by a 9-millimeter handgun. An open bottle of alcohol was also discovered in the vehicle. A doctor at Insight Hospital drew Evans’ blood about three hours after the crash, at around 6:30 p.m., and it revealed a blood alcohol percentage of.175 – more than double the Illinois legal driving limit.
The device discovered in Evans’ vehicle is not considered a minor accessory under federal law. According to the ATF, an auto-sear attachment, also known as a Glock switch, is legally classed as a machine gun on its own under National Firearms Act restrictions, and can result in up to 10 years in federal prison regardless of whether it is ever linked to a handgun. The gadgets may increase a handgun’s rate of fire to approximately 1,200 rounds per minute.
Over a two-year span, Chicago law enforcement discovered roughly 1,200 Glock handguns equipped with illegal auto-sear switches, echoing a 784 percent national surge in machine gun conversion device recoveries recorded between 2019 and 2023, according to Everytown Research and Policy. According to WTTW News, the City of Chicago filed a lawsuit against gun manufacturer Glock in March 2024, stating that the firm manufactures pistols that may be readily converted into full-auto weapons.
Evans was not supposed to have a handgun at all. He had completed two years of probation following a 2019 conviction in Cook County for aggravated unauthorized use of a weapon, which meant he was legally forbidden from owning a firearm at the time of the October 2023 shooting, according to CWB Chicago.
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