Gun Used In Unsolved Rogers Park Murders Linked To 2 Shootings

CHICAGO — A gun linked to two unsolved murders in Rogers Park has been linked to two more shootings on Chicago's West Side, a source told Chicago's ABC 7. Last fall, Chicago Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson said shell casings from a pair of murders just a day apart showed that the same weapon was used in both killings.

A suspect, wearing a black coat, black hat and a black mask over his face, was caught on surveillance camera after both murders.

On the morning of Sept. 30, Douglass Watts, 73, was walking his dogs in the 1400 block of West Sherwin when someone shot him in the head in what police described as an "execution-style" shooting.

Surveillance footage showed the masked suspect walking down a sidewalk after the killing wearing a hat and face mask despite the mild weather. The suspect was also seen on camera jogging down an alley after Watts' murder.

The next night, at around 10:20 p.m., Eliyahu Moscowitz, 24, was also shot in the head in the 1100 block of West Lunt Avenue on the Loyola Park path.

A source told ABC Chicago that the murder weapon, which was never recovered, has since been used in two additional shootings on the West Side.

In October, the Jewish United Fund/Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago announced it was offering a more than $20,000 reward for information leading to the murder suspect's arrest in the Rogers Park killings.

Last fall, police said they believed the suspect lived in the neighborhood, and some residents of the area were terrified to leave their homes in the wake of the crimes.

Because Watts was gay and Moscowitz was an observant Jew, some residents expressed concern that the killings were hate crimes, but police had not found a motive in the attacks.

"These murderous attacks are reverberating throughout the Jewish, LGBTQ and the broader communities," JUF/Federation President Steven Nasatir said in a statement last fall. "...we are determined to do whatever we can to aid the community as well as law enforcement's efforts to apprehend whoever is responsible."