Wheeling man gets 5 years for gang shooting

Firing a .22-caliber handgun at a supposed rival is one thing. Doing so with a toddler in tow is another.

Cook County Judge Thomas Fecarotta intimated as much when he sentenced Wheeling resident Jobanie Rodriguez to five years in the Illinois Department of Corrections after the 19-year-old pleaded guilty to a charge of aggravated discharge of a firearm Wednesday in a Rolling Meadows courtroom.

The gang-related shooting took place in June in a Wheeling parking lot off Lake Cook Road. Police said Rodriguez thought he recognized a rival gang member in a car going through a McDonald's drive-through. Rodriguez exited the car in which he and his 2-year old daughter were riding, approached the other car and fired at the two men inside, they said. Police arrested Rodriguez a short-time later, after a brief foot chase.

Announcing his sentence, Fecarotta said he hoped incarceration would inspire Rodriguez, who served 12 months probation for a 2006 burglary, to change his ways.

Later, in a related incident, a 17-year-old Wheeling High School student who police described as a fellow gang member of Rodriguez, was charged with communicating with a witness for contacting one of the men Rodriguez shot at. The Wheeling junior next appears in court Oct. 16.