An 18-year-old man was charged Saturday in connection with a shooting that wounded two Chicago police officers on the city's South Side Tuesday night.
Angel Gomez was the alleged driver of the car in which the shooters were riding, Chicago Police confirmed in a press conference Sunday morning.
Meanwhile, the gunman, a 17-year old member of the La Raza street gang, is the target of a police manhunt.
"It's not like the van was throwing up gang signs at them or pointing weapons at them," Chicago P.D. Commander Brendan Deenihan said. "They shot right into the back of it. It could have been a van full of kids for all they know."
The shooting occurred around 9:15 p.m. Tuesday night in the 4300 block of S. Ashland Ave. in the city's Back of the Yards neighborhood.
The 9th District officers were in an unmarked vehicle, dressed in civilian clothes with vests bearing CPD badges at the time of the attack.
One officer was shot in the arm and hip and the other in the back, authorities said, and they were taken to Stroger Hospital where their conditions were stabilized. Both officers were released from the hospital by Wednesday afternoon.
At Sunday's press conference, officers revealed that the suspect's fellow gang members are helping in the investigation into the shooting.
"For some reason shooting back and forth at each other, they think it's some sort of game," Deenihan said. "But they know how serious it is when the police are involved. You have two officers who almost died."
Multiple sources confirmed that one of the officers is the son of a deputy chief, though further information on their identities was not released due to “high security concerns” for both men.
Guglielmi said the officers "were targeted" in the shooting, which Chicago Fraternal Order of Police president Kevin Graham said occurred “without provocation.”
The shooting prompted a massive manhunt for the suspects, involving a police helicopter and K-9 unit. Two weapons were recovered in the search, officials said, at least one of which was a high-powered assault rifle discovered in a vehicle seized at the scene.
