Shootout at Chicago store leaves 4 dead, 2 wounded

A shootout between gunmen who entered a store and its employees on Chicago’s South Side ended with four people dead and two others wounded, police said.

The shooting Wednesday night happened at The Connect store, which sells cell phones, groceries and dollar-store items near the city’s Altgeld Gardens housing complex. Police said the gunmen walked into the store and opened fire at about 9:30 p.m. At least one store employee fired back, police said.

The Cook County Medical Examiner’s office identified those killed as Michael Banks, 30; Alex Spikes, 17; Ihab Arafeh, 45, of Lansing; and Weam Salem, 25, of Worth. It wasn’t immediately clear which victims worked in the store, and the hometowns for Banks and Spikes haven’t been released.

A 39-year-old woman was hospitalized in serious condition, and another 17-year-old boy was shot in the leg and wounded.

Police spokesmen would not discuss a potential motive, saying only that the investigation was ongoing. No one has been charged in the shooting, but multiple people were being interviewed.

Brandon Phillips, who sold cell phones at the store, told Chicago television station WLS that the shooting was “crazy.”

“It’s hard to believe, especially somebody you were just with yesterday,” Phillips said. “I was with them every day, you know?”

Trina Brown said she was a customer at The Connect.

“They treated me with the utmost respect, everyone around here,” she told the television station. “No one can say a bad thing about them at all under no circumstances.”

Dozens of people gathered at the store after the shooting, with some crying and hugging each other, the Chicago Tribune reported. Police broke up a brief fistfight between some people there and restrained another man who ran through yellow police tape, the newspaper reported.