Investigation continues into police shooting of Gurnee man

Details remain murky regarding the pursuit of a Gurnee man shot to death by police Friday night on a Metra train headed to Fox Lake, in part because the investigation into the slaying for which 32-year-old Jamal Parks was a suspect is ongoing.

"That's still an ongoing homicide investigation, and, as such, we (cannot) get into what led us to him," said Tim McCarthy, the Orland Park police chief and chairman and spokesman of the South Suburban Major Crimes Task Force,

Meanwhile, the Illinois State Police Public Integrity Task Force has been asked to investigate the shooting of Parks on a Milwaukee District North Line train stopped at the Lake-Cook Road station in Deerfield. Police said officers were trying to take Parks into custody at about 10:30 p.m. Friday as part of a murder investigation when they traded gunfire with the Gurnee man.

The task force investigates police shootings in the suburbs to help determine if they are justified.

Parks was a suspect in the Thursday night slaying of David Murrell, 34, of Chicago. Murrell was shot to death inside an SUV in a Walgreens parking lot in South suburban Evergreen Park, police said.

McCarthy said surveillance video shows three people involved in the shooting.

Little has been revealed about Parks other than that he has a criminal record that includes arrests in both Illinois and Wisconsin, including one for felony possession of a firearm.

Neighbors in the Northlake Farms Apartments in Gurnee where Parks lived said Sunday they did not know him. Records indicate he has also had recent addresses in Chicago and Kenosha, Wisconsin.

According to Illinois State Police, members of the West Division of the South Suburban Major Crimes Task Force followed Parks on Friday as he rode the train. West Division members requested assistance from Deerfield police as the train halted at the Deerfield station.

"He was located on the train," McCarthy said. "Officers surrounded the train and then entered the train car itself, where Mr. Parks ran up to the upper deck."

McCarthy said three officers climbed to the narrow upper deck of the train to apprehend him.

"He resisted," McCarthy said. "It's very narrow. Only one officer could really make contact with him. He broke away, pulled the weapon and began firing multiple rounds in the direction of the officers, who retreated down the stairs."

Officers also returned fire, striking Parks, who was taken to a nearby hospital and pronounced dead. No officers were injured in the exchange.

The Lake County coroner's office is scheduled to conduct an autopsy Monday.