Johnny Vargas was 19 when he was shot and killed in Chicago on March 15, 2012. His death occurred during a year that saw a sharp rise in killings across the city, with Chicago recording 506 homicides in 2012 and March of that year seeing more than double the homicides of March 2011.

Commentary at the time linked the surge to several factors mentioned by observers: an unusually warm early spring, and the disbanding of specialized gang units within the Chicago Police Department that had focused enforcement in high-crime neighborhoods. Vargas’s murder is one of many used to illustrate the human toll of that spike in gun violence and the complex mix of social and policy issues the city faced.

If anyone knew Johnny Vargas or has information about the March 15, 2012 shooting, please share what you remember with investigators or in this thread.