De La Salle's Elliott Brown drives against Loyola in 2007. | File Photo by Scott Powers/for the Sun-Times
By SAM CHARLES, JORDAN OWEN AND ANDREW GRIMMChicago Sun-Times
Former De La Salle High School basketball and football star Elliott Brown was killed and a woman wounded in a shooting Wednesday afternoon on the Chicago Skyway bridge over the Calumet River.
Brown, 25, was driving a BMW coupe southbound on the Skyway (I-90) about 1:30 p.m. when it was approached by a black SUV as it crossed the bridge, authorities said.
Someone in the SUV opened fire, striking Brown multiple times. A 23-year-old woman passenger was shot in the left arm, police said. The SUV then continued southbound.
Brown of the 4000 block of South Calumet, was dead at the scene, police said.
Brown played basketball and football for four years at De La Salle Institute at 3434 S. Michigan before he graduated in 2008. He was described by former teammates as a “supernatural” athlete.
“Teams would game plan against him like no tomorrow,” said former football teammate Mark Rangel. “No tomorrow.”
Rangel said that after high school, Brown played football at Missouri State University for a time before returning to Chicago after he had a son. After coming home, he played basketball for Malcolm X College.
The woman was taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital, where her condition was stabilized, police said.
Police believe the shooter and the victims had “prior contact” before the shooting.
The BMW was registered to a home about a mile from the scene of the shooting, though the registered owner’s name did not match those of two names mentioned in police radio chatter.
Traffic on the outbound lanes of the Skyway was closed for about four hours as investigators worked the scene.