Mass Killings Have Claimed 129 Lives In Illinois Since 2006

ILLINOIS — At least 129 people have died in 27 mass killings in Illinois since 2006, according to data compiled by The Associated Press and made available to Patch.

Nationally, more than 2,400 people have died in 457 mass killings — defined by The AP as incidents in which four or more people died — in the past 15-year, four-month period.

They died by gunfire nearly 80 percent of the time, and victims died at the hands of family members almost as often as they did in schools, workplaces and other public venues. Stabbings were the second-most frequent cause of death, occurring in 7 percent of cases.

The danger people face inside their homes at the hands of family members is echoed in a recent study by the Council on Criminal Justice showing that domestic violence spiked

by 8.1 percent in the United States following the imposition of stay-at-home warnings to control the spread of the coronavirus.

"I'm just thinking of the toll that it's taken on victims of domestic violence, and then the children in the house who experience and witness that violence," researcher Alex Piquero, a professor in the department of sociology at the University of Miami and a criminologist who co-authored the study, told U.S. News & World Report.

Over the period analyzed by The AP, 998 people died in 219 mass killings committed by family members.

In Illinois, there have been 10 mass killings committed by family members since 2006, resulting in 44 deaths.

Guns were used in 18 of the 27 mass killings in Illinois. Smoke inhalation and burns were listed as the primary cause of death in seven incidents, and blunt force was the primary cause of death in two incidents and was a factor in two others.

Mass killings in Illinois since 2006 include:

Chicago to Evanston mass shooting spree, 5 killed

On Jan. 9, 2021, a gunman went on a killing spree, shooting seven people. Three people died the day of the attacks, with two others dying in the days and weeks that followed. The shooting spree ended when the gunman was killed in an exchange of gunfire with police.

Killed were:

• Damia Smith, 15, a student at Morgan Park High School, shot while riding in the back of her mother's car
• Yiran Fan, 30, a University of Chicago graduate student, killed as he sat in his parked car
• Aisha Nevell, 46, a security guard shot in the vestibule of an apartment building
• Anthony Faulkner, 30, who recently moved back to Chicago, shot in a convenience store
• Marta Torres, 61, also known as "Chacha," an Evanston grandmother and teaching assistant, shot in an IHOP restaurant near the end of the shooting spree

Police later said that the gun used in the killings had been used in at least five other shootings dating back to 2009.

Chicago apartment shooting, 5 killed

On Oct. 12, 2020, a 66-year-old retiree walked into a neighbor's apartment in the building where he'd lived for 15 years and fatally shot four people as they ate dinner. He then went into another apartment, fatally shooting another woman, and was eventually taken into custody.

A 21-year-old man survived the shooting but "lost his whole family," WGN reported.

Killed were Tzvetanka Kostadinov and Ivaylo Popov, who lived in one of the apartments, and their guests Iskra Popova and David Hanik. The fifth victim was identified as Jolanta Topolska.

The shooter was facing eviction for non-payment of condo fees as well as foreclosure on his mortgage. He had filed for bankruptcy in September 2017, reporting that he owed $24,000 to the Internal Revenue Service and more than $60,000 to creditors. The assailant left two notes written in Polish behind in his apartment reflecting his determination to carry out the murders.

Mobile home arson fire, 5 killed

On April 6, 2019, five family members perished after police say a 9-year-old intentionally set fire to a mobile home in Goodfield, Illinois. The deaths included two adults and three children.

The fire killed Ariel Wall, 1; Rose Alwood and Daemeon Wall, both 2; Kathryn Murray, 69; and Jason Wall, 34. The 9-year-old boy and his mother survived the fire.

The boy's mother said her son suffers from schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and ADHD, and takes medication daily. No child that young has been accused in a mass killing since at least 2006, according to the AP/USATODAY/Northeastern University mass murder database. Last summer, the boy was found to be unfit to stand trial.

Henry Pratt Shooting, 5 killed

On Feb. 15, 2019, five men were killed during a termination meeting with a disgruntled employee who "was not supposed to possess a firearm." Police said the 45-year-old man, who had a previous criminal record, had a revoked Firearm Owners ID, but his guns had never been confiscated.

Killed were:

• Clayton Parks, 32, of Elgin, human resources manager
• Trevor Wehner, 21, of DeKalb, human resources intern and Northern Illinois University student
• Russell Beyer, 46, of Yorkville, mold operator
• Vicente Juarez, 55, of Oswego, stockroom attendant and forklift operator
• Josh Pinkard, 37, of Oswego, plant manager

The gunman was also killed during a confrontation with police, five officers were shot and wounded, and a sixth suffered a knee injury.

'I Love You; I've Been Shot At Work,' Aurora Victim Texted Wife

With 27 mass killings claiming 129 lives in Illinois since 2006, there are too many to list. Other notorious mass killings in the state include the still-unsolved 2008 Lane Bryant murders in Tinley Park, which claimed the lives of five women; the 2007 Vaughn family murders, in which an Oswego man pulled his vehicle over on an isolated frontage road off I-55 near Channahon and fatally shot his wife and three children; and the Valentine's Day 2008 mass shooting at Northern Illinois University, which took five lives. The NIU shooter also took his own life.

Over the last decade and a half, 2008 was Illinois' worst year for mass killings, with 23 dead.

View the full data on mass killings in Illinois here.

Focus on mass shootings

The AP database does not come close to measuring the enormous scope of gun violence and its toll on victims and their families, witnesses, first responders and society in general.

Much of the focus on mass killings has been on instances when a shooter opens fire in a crowded public place, as multimillionaire Stephen Paddock did in 2017 when he fired upon a concert crowd on the street below his Mandalay Bay hotel room, killing 60 people (two of the victims died years later from their injuries). Of the 867 people injured, 411 were by gunfire.

But experts say mass killings with high death counts are only a part of America’s problem with gun violence, overshadowing the increase in domestic and interpersonal violence.

Lisa Geller, state affairs manager at the nonprofit Coalition to Stop Gun Violence in Washington, told NBC News those shootings and killings are often seen as “private events.”

“If we're talking about mass shootings, those tend to be left out because they're seen as private events,” Geller said. “Some of these high-lethality events are inherently random, but if you include some of the events in private spaces, the role of domestic violence in mass shootings is large.”

What happened in 2020, a year many Americans spent isolated in their homes to control the spread of the coronavirus, bears that out.

Last year, there were 108 mass killings. That’s fewer than half the 237 reported in 2019, but the number of mass killings committed by family members actually increased.

In 2020, there were 31 such killings that left 136 people dead, compared with 20 mass killings that left 88 people dead in 2019.

The trend so far in 2021 is alarming, and if it continues at the current pace, the year will be as deadly as previous years. The AP database, current through April 28, shows a dozen mass killings with 68 total victims, five of them committed by family members and leaving 23 people dead.

The AP database does not include those who died in a spate of mass killings already in May, including those at a deadly Colorado birthday party over the weekend.

In all categories in Illinois:

• 5 people died in mass killings in 2021
• 4 people died in mass killings in 2020
• 15 people died in mass killings in 2019
• 8 people died in mass killings in 2017
• 15 people died in mass killings in 2016
• 4 people died in mass killings in 2015
• 4 people died in mass killings in 2014
• 9 people died in mass killings in 2013
• 4 people died in mass killings in 2012
• 4 people died in mass killings in 2011
• 20 people died in mass killings in 2010
• 5 people died in mass killings in 2009
• 23 people died in mass killings in 2008
• 9 people died in mass killings in 2007