Fourteen-year-old Erick Alfaro was shot and killed while walking through the Blackhawk Estates mobile home community in unincorporated Elk Grove Township near Des Plaines on the evening of May 4, 2022. Around 7:15 p.m., a dark-colored SUV pulled up along the 400 block of West Touhy Avenue and, according to early accounts, someone inside opened fire; Erick collapsed with a fatal gunshot wound to the head and was later pronounced dead by the medical examiner.

Deputies cordoned off the mobile home lanes where he lived, just steps from his front door, and investigators collected shell casings, traced the SUV’s route and sought surveillance footage from nearby homes and businesses. Family and friends remembered him at a memorial visitation in Wheeling. The case remained open in the sheriff’s cold-case files, and in July 2024 the Cook County Sheriff’s Office renewed a public appeal seeking two suspected gunmen and information about the dark SUV’s movements before or after the attack. No arrests had been announced.

If anyone has information about the shooters, the vehicle, or its movements that evening, please come forward.