At least nine people were fatally shot and 34 people were shot in separate shooting incidents across Chicago starting on Friday and ending on Monday morning, according to police in updates on Aug. 3.
Among those shot and killed was a 9-year-old boy, Janari Ricks, who was playing outside when gunfire erupted, police said.
"It's just crazy. My boy, he's gone; that was my inspiration, that was my truth," Janari's father Raymond Ricks said, according to ABC7. "He wanted to play basketball. He was just a basketball fanatic."
A 17-year-old boy, Caleb Reed, was also shot and killed over the weekend in a separate shooting, officials said. Officers discovered him lying on the sidewalk at around 1 p.m. on Friday. He was pronounced dead two days later on Sunday at St. Francis Hospital, the ABC affiliate station reported.
"We care. we want the city to know that we are here, as a motorcycle community we are tired of watching kids die," community activist Dawn Valenti told the news outlet.
George Bady, the head of Stop The Violence, said children are scared.
"They are very scared; they are scared to come outside, they are scared to sit in their front rooms now, some scared to go outside because they might not make it back home," Bady said.
President Donald Trump in July announced that federal agents would be sent to Chicago and other cities as part of Operation Legend, which will seek to curb the increase in crime in cities. Following the George Floyd-related protests in May and June, a number of metropolitan areas have seen spikes in crime and shootings as animus towards police officers and departments has grown.
“Our gun problem is related to the fact that we have too many illegal guns on our streets, 60 percent of which come from states outside of Illinois," she said.