Rogers Park shooting: Northwestern student shot in Willye B. White Park, officials say

CHICAGO (WLS) -- According to Northwestern University, a 19-year-old student was shot off-campus on Monday night while walking through a park in the Rogers Park neighborhood.

ABC7 spoke with people who live nearby in the surrounding homes.

"I just heard these loud gunshots," said Robbie Staggers, who lives nearby. "Really loud. 'Boom, boom, boom, boom.' Like it was in my house, that's how loud it was. Yeah, it was scary. Why would they shoot a girl? For what?"

Police said the shooting happened around 10:18 p.m. The undergraduate student was walking through Willye B. White Park when gunfire rang out.

"I'm usually walking down the street at 10-10:30 p.m. So, it's very disturbing knowing that so frequently, the shootings happen in this area," said Eva McCann.

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Police were seen collecting shell casings in the dugout area and around the park. The 19-year-old woman, shot in the chest and abdomen, was taken to St. Francis Hospital in good condition, police said.

She was not the intended target.

Northwestern University said Student Affairs staff were at the hospital to provide support.

"We are heartbroken and outraged that gun violence continues to have such an impact on members of our community and on the greater Chicago area. Please keep this student and their family in your thoughts," the school said in a statement.

McCann said she has lived in the neighborhood since she was in college herself. Gunfire, she said, has become an all too common sound.

"I'm on the Park Advisory Council here, and we try to create programs for the young people in the neighborhood to give them more positive activities, besides hanging out on the streets and so forth. So, we try to do things in the neighborhood and there's only so much we can do," McCann said.

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