FOREST PARK, Ill. — A man suspected of killing four people aboard a Chicago-area transit train shot them at close range while they were asleep, officials said Tuesday.
The shooting took place before 5:30 a.m. Monday aboard the Chicago area’s L system, on a Blue Line train that was moving near where the line ends in Forest Park, a suburb about 10 miles (16 kilometers) west of downtown Chicago. A suspect was later arrested on another Chicago Transit Authority L line, according to police.
Forest Park Mayor Rory Hoskins said the victims likely didn’t even see the shooter.
“They were shot execution-style as they slept,” Hoskins told The Associated Press on Tuesday.
On the same day, authorities filed first-degree murder charges against a 30-year-old Chicago man in the train deaths.
Three men and one woman were killed, according to the Cook County medical examiner’s office. Forest Park police said all four were adults, but officials did not yet have exact ages yet for all of them.
Police said a preliminary investigation shows the victims were on two different cars as the Blue Line train was headed toward Forest Park. The Blue Line runs 24 hours and stretches from that suburb through downtown Chicago to O’Hare International Airport. It runs both below and above ground.
The suspected shooter fled and was caught by Chicago police later in the day on a train on another route.
Police were able to find the suspect thanks to video footage from the train, Hoskins said. The suspect was later transferred to the custody of Forest Park police.
CTA officials, who said they were assisting in the investigation, said security footage “proved to be vital.” The CTA’s Green Line also ends in Forest Park and runs 24 hours a day.
“Although this matter remains under investigation, all current information points this being an isolated incident,” CTA President Dorval Carter Jr. said in a statement.
Forest Park police are used to calls to the busy transit stops there, Hoskins said. Over the years, nonprofit organizations have also used the transportation hubs for outreach and providing medical care and other services to homeless people who seek refuge aboard the trains, particularly in winter.
But the mass shooting in the community of 14,000 people has sparked new fears. Hoskins, whose position as mayor is part time, said he couldn’t recall a homicide being reported in Forest Park in years.
His teenage son takes the L to school and he watched a little closer than usual at Tuesday morning’s drop off.
“People are rattled,” he said. “We want to make them feel safe.”
