GIRL, 8, CAUGHT IN CROSSFIRE OF GANGS

Victim Called Likely Casualty Of Drug War

Police Sunday were investigating the shooting death of an 8-year-old
South Side girl, who police said may have been an innocent victim in
the increasingly heated war between rival gangs trafficking in crack
cocaine.

Paulette Peake was buying candy with her aunt at 9:30 p.m. Saturday at
a liquor and grocery store at 79th and Sangamon Streets when four or
five shots were fired from the street, police said. A witness said
Pauline turned around when she heard one shot and was struck in the
chest by a bullet that came through a store window.

Police questioned two gang members Sunday. No charges had been brought
in connection with the shooting late Sunday, and no one was in
custody. Police weren't sure at whom the gunman was aiming or if the
shots might have been fired from a passing vehicle.

Police believe that Paulette may have been caught in the crossfire of
a gang war brewing on 79th Street between Ashland Avenue and Peoria
Street in the South Side's Auburn Gresham neighborhood, the site of
two double homicides in recent months.

On July 21, two teens were gunned down in their car near the
intersection of 79th and South Laflin Streets, and two teenagers were
shot to death just a block south of that site on April 14. No arrests
have been made in either shooting.

"Lately, it's been a little worse than usual," said gang crimes Sgt.
Mike Kummethn, with the Gresham District's tactical unit: "You could
say it's on a daily basis having shots fired," on 79th Street.

Dividing the Vice Lords territory to the north and Blackstones on the
south, and with the Black Disciples controlling turf west of Morgan
Street, 79th Street for years has been the site of struggles for
control of neighborhood crack cocaine sales, Kummeth said.

But the fighting has worsened in recent weeks with the breakdown of a
truce brokered by police last summer, Kummeth said. And the recent
dismantling of gang leadership--such as the high-profile crackdown on
the Gangster Disciples--has made it difficult to re-establish order,
he said.

"We used to be able to put the word out by grabbing leaders and
saying, `Cool it or else,' " Kummeth said. "But recently . . . so many
of them have been put in jail that we just don't have anybody who can
send a message."

In the battle for the corner of 79th and Sangamon, Pat's Food and
Liquor Store, where Pauline was killed, has frequently been hit by
gunfire. Manager Michael Mustafa said the sound of gun shots sends his
cashiers ducking behind the counter nearly every weekend.

As if to prove the point, the bullet hole punched in the plate glass
window Saturday night was next to two others from past shootings that
had been taped over.

A cashier who worked Saturday night and declined to identify himself
said he is used to hearing gunfire on his shift. But he was shaken by
the homicide.

"They knew with all this shooting, somebody had to get hit, and it had
to happen with this 8-year-old girl," he said.

The violence of the commercial strip is incongruous with the
tree-dotted residential neighborhood of brick homes and apartments
where Paulette Peak's mother, Pauline, moved with her three children
about six months ago to be closer to her ailing mother.

Peake, who turned 29 Sunday, had left her daughter Saturday night with
her aunt, Sabrina Lions, while she and her other daughter, Darnisha,
7, went to a birthday party. A cousin grabbed Peake at the party to
break the news.

"She said, `C'mon, 'cause your baby's been shot,"' Peake said. "I told
her, `Don't play me. My baby wasn't shot. My baby wasn't shot.' "

Paulette was pronounced dead at Christ Hospital and Medical Center in
Oak Lawn at 10:03 p.m. Saturday.

Peake calmly fielded calls from relatives Sunday afternoon and shared
stories about Paulette as she sat with family and friends in the
living room of her apartment.

They mourned for a spirited girl they said loved to play baseball,
dance to Whitney Houston and R. Kelly, and eat nacho-flavored
sunflower seeds. She made the honor roll two years in a row at Kohn
Elementary School, where she was about to enter 3rd grade. A school
trophy for citizenship on the mantle attested to her love for school.

"She wanted to go to college," Peake said. "All she said is, `I want
to become a doctor when I graduate from college and take care of my
family.' And they just shattered my baby's dream."