CHICAGO (FOX 32 News) -
FIRST ON FOX: One of two Chicago girls shot and wounded as they walked through a West Pullman park Tuesday night is talking exclusively to Fox Chicago News.
"Gunshots just started going everywhere," 13-year-old Tishona Polk told Fox Chicago's Darlene Hill. "I wasn't scared, I didn't feel nothing, just my body went numb. I wasn't scared."
The shooting happened near 117th and Throop around 7 p.m. Tuesday.
The girls were taking a break on a park bench when one of the girls told police she saw a car riding around slowly, and she knew something bad was going to happen.
Fox Chicago News has learned the boys in the vehicle were gang members allegedly trying to keep their rivals off the block.
Police sources say they fired a couple of shots early in the day, but came back when the park was crowded.
Polk was hit once. Her friend, 12-year-old Nakia Turner, was shot in the stomach.
Polk's mother, Mildred Shorter, says the girls were headed to the nearby Kroc Community Center, where it costs eight dollars per person to enter. She says she wishes it was free, and that a lot of kids could find a safe haven there.
Shorter is also angry that gang members are shooting at each other while grammar school children are playing in the park. She said Mayor Rahm Emanuel contacted her by phone and gave her his support.
Nakia's uncle, Cory Henderson, said there are a lot of children in the neighborhood who no longer feel they can play outdoors safely, which is not fair. He said his niece had emergency surgery at Advocate Christ Medical Center and should make a full recovery.
Area South detectives are investigating the shooting as a possible drive-by attack. Police are looking for a car that the girls described: a red Pontiac, possibly involved in the shooting.
Police think the shooting was gang-related. Community activists said gang tension is a real problem in the area.
"You got kids trying to go to college here," a Pullman Ceasefire interrupter said. "Just think about it. If you need a job, neat help with your education, we're out here. We're here to help you. So let's try to change your life around."
That Ceasefire interrupter made a plea to the gang members apparently involved in this shooting, to stop the violence.
The Ceasefire interrupters said the hospital called them to the scene to try to reduce tension in the neighborhood, because sometimes when there's a gang shooting, there can be another one right after. But these girls were not the intended targets.
Mayor Emanuel has been calling out gang members in the city, demanding that they leave the children alone. He spoke out again, with regard to this shooting, making the same firm demand.
Tashona Polk, 13.
