A 58-year-old woman found strangled in her Logan Square home appeared happy and upbeat just days earlier, according to a neighbor.
A friend found 58-year-old Bernadette Glomski dead in her home in the 2500 block of West Moffat Street on April 15, authorities said. An autopsy later concluded she died of asphyxia by strangulation and her death was ruled a homicide, according to the Cook County medical examiner’s office.
“It’s heartbreaking. You don’t want to hear that happen to anyone … especially like 50 feet from your own bed,” said upstairs neighbor Keithon Gipson. “Whatever the situation, nobody deserves that.” Read more
Logan Square has long been known for its public art projects and, more recently, for its trendy restaurants and bustling bars.
Lately, it’s also become one of the city’s hot spots for murder.
There have been five killings so far this year in the Northwest Side neighborhood. That puts Logan Square in a four-way tie with North Lawndale, Roseland and South Shore for the third-most murders this year among Chicago’s 77 official community areas.
The only areas with more murders this year: Austin, with seven, and West Englewood, with six.
Over the past decade, it’s taken a full year, on average, for Logan Square to see as many killings as it already has this year in less than four months. Read more
Chicago Police got off to a rough start this year, with 30 percent more murders reported than in the first three months of 2014.
But residents of the Southwest Side’s Ashburn community don’t need a calculator to work out that killings are on the rise in their part of town.
Over the last decade, middle-class Ashburn has averaged less than four killings per year. This year, it’s suffered four murders already.
It’s come as a shock in a community that had a reputation for being relatively safe. Of its 42,000 residents, more than half of whom are black, about 83 percent have at least a high school degree. The median income is about $67,000 – above the average for Chicago, according to census data.
“It used to be really nice around here,” said Ayinde Brown, 19, who regularly visits his grandmother in Ashburn. Read more
Alexander Villafane named his youth football program after his second-favorite NFL team, the New England Patriots, family said.
The 39-year-old football coach did not get to see the Patriots win Super Bowl XLIX this month because he was fatally shot in the head while working on a vehicle less than a week before the game, family said.
Villafane was replacing a stolen catalytic converter when he was wounded during a Jan. 25 drive-by shooting in the 3500 block of West 24th Street, family said. Read more
Rayvon Little left his Minnesota home as a teenager to come live with his grandmother in Englewood, family said.
Christine Little said her grandson was a quiet young man who often spent his time at home reading or watching Christian television with her.
Christine Little said she was close to her grandson, and when she recently encouraged him to go visit his family in Minnesota he requested she accompany him.
Rayvon Little, 20, never got the chance to return to Minnesota because he was fatally shot Nov. 1, 2014, in the 6700 block of South Morgan Street. Read more
Darrell Tolbert was a “momma’s boy” who, earlier this year, elaborately decorated an entire wall of his mother’s home with carefully composed photos and artfully arranged notes for her birthday.
His mother never got the chance to return the favor because Tolbert was fatally shot Nov. 4 in the 600 block of North Avers Avenue in the West Garfield Park neighborhood, authorities said. He would have turned 37 about a month later, and his mother had already started the birthday preparations.
“I was preparing in my dining room for [a] celebration with his family,” his mother, Larain Tolbert, said. “This is the first birthday in 37 years that he won’t be here. I just want to celebrate with my family and let my son know that he’s with me in spirit always.” Read more
Alexandria Burgos enjoyed working with children and wanted to pursue a career in social work, her mother said.
“Her goal [was] to work in the Cook County Juvenile Detention Center,” said Burgos mother, Milagros Burgos. “She had her heart set up to help kids that needed help.”
Alexandria Burgos, 18, was fatally shot in the 5300 block of West Oakdale Avenue about 12:35 a.m. Oct. 19, authorities said.
She was sitting in an apartment when gunfire erupted outside and one of the bullets came through the window and struck her in the head, police said.
Milagros Burgos said her daughter had recently started a new job at a YMCA in north suburban Niles. On the night of the shooting, she left work, briefly stopped home then went to pick up a sibling from a friend’s home, where she was shot.
“She did her sisterly duty,” Milagros Burgos said. “She was a protective sister and he knew that, she was always there when he needed her.” Read more
Little Black Pearl Art & Design Academy student Michael Faheem Bloodson recently developed a passion for glassblowing.
Bloodson, 17, was shot in head in the 3900 block of South Prairie Avenue in the Bronzeville neighborhood about 3 p.m. Sept. 13, authorities said. He died at John H. Stroger Jr. Hospital of Cook County less than an hour later.
“It hurts so much because he had his whole future ahead of him,” said his grandmother, Debra Bloodson. “So many things we could have done. I looked forward to my grandson being something very special, because whatever he did, he would do it very well.”
At Bloodson’s funeral, one of his teachers brought his grandmother the glasswork he made for her in class. Read more
Tamica Riley was smothered to death Sept. 14 in the 800 block of South California Avenue in the West Garfield Park neighborhood.
Prosecutors claim Andrea Brown, 23, believed Riley owed her money and took Riley’s shoes. Brown said she wouldn’t give 37-year-old Riley her shoes back until she paid the money she owed, prosecutors said. Read more
What is Homicide Watch Chicago?
Homicide Watch Chicago is dedicated to the proposition that murder is never a run-of-the-mill story. Attention must be paid to each one, not merely a select and particularly tragic few. We understand the reality of the public’s demand for news - that some stories get more attention than others. But all murders represent a degree of human suffering - direct and indirect - that cannot be ignored. Read more…
