Gun violence claimed the life of three at a Chicago’s Mercy Hospital on Monday afternoon, including a doctor whom family members described as having a “heart of gold.”
According to NBC Chicago, Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson said on Monday that the violence started in the hospital parking lot at around 3:28 p.m. when the shooter –
identified as Juan Lopez – and Dr. Tamara O’Neal reportedly got into a verbal altercation.
A friend tried to step in, but that was when Lopez lifted his shirt and showed a handgun. The friend ran back into the hospital, and O’Neal was shot and killed.
Officers began to arrive at the scene, and the shooter fired at the officers before they got out of their vehicles, before running into the hospital. The shooter and the police exchanged gunfire. A pharmaceutical assistant – identified as Dayna Less – was shot and killed while exiting an elevator.
One police officer, Samuel Jimenez, was also shot during the exchange and was rushed to the hospital in critical condition but later died from his wounds.
“He and his partner were actually doing something else. When they pulled up, they heard the gunshots, and they did what the heroic officers always do: They ran toward that gunfire,” Johnson said of Jimenez,
according to CBS News.
Lopez also died in the shooting, though it is unclear if he shot himself or if he was killed by police.
According to
CBS, the gunman and O’Neal had previously set a wedding date for Oct. 27, but the date passed without the couple getting married. It is unclear why the wedding was called off.
