Two men were killed early on Sunday, November 1, when gunfire erupted outside a neighbourhood bar in East Chicago, Indiana, sending more than 30 rounds through a residential street, according to East Chicago police reporting carried by ABC7 Chicago.

Source: ABC7 Chicago (WLS-TV)

Police said ShotSpotter gunfire-detection technology picked up dozens of shots shortly before 2 a.m. near OJ's Game Over Bar on 151st Street. The two men who were killed were aged 20 and 36. Their names had not been released in the reporting available on Sunday evening.

A neighbour ran out and tried to save one of the men

Audrey DeAvila, who lives behind the bar, told ABC7 she heard the gunfire and ran outside to help the wounded men before officers arrived. She said she and another woman tried to stop the bleeding and performed CPR on one victim. “It was uncalled for, it was unnecessary and it was so wasteful. So wasteful. Two lives, are you serious? For what?” DeAvila said.

“Me and his girlfriend were trying to stop the blood, try to apply pressure. We tried CPR. We tried, and that poor baby. He was so young,” she said. “The only prayer I could think of was Hail Mary, and I said it with him because you could literally see the life circling in this man's eyes. Why? For what? Over crazy words,” she added — a remark investigators have not confirmed as an account of what started the shooting.

Police chief: homes and cars were hit in a residential area

After the shooting, bullet holes were visible in nearby vehicles and homes. East Chicago Police Chief Jose Rivera said the volume of gunfire put people sleeping inside those homes at serious risk. “No respect was given. That's a residential area. Several vehicles. Several homes,” Rivera said, according to ABC7 Chicago.

Source: InterNewscast — ABC7 Chicago reporting, Nov 1, 2026

Investigators recovered two semiautomatic handguns lying on the ground beside the victims. Police have not said who fired the more than 30 rounds, whether the victims themselves fired, or whether other shooters fled before officers arrived. No motive has been identified, and police have not described the shooting as targeted or random — those questions remain open in the investigation.

Where this happened

East Chicago is a city of roughly 26,000 people in Lake County, in Indiana's northwest corner on Lake Michigan, immediately east of Chicago, Illinois. The bar stands on 151st Street in a residential neighbourhood — the detail police kept returning to on Sunday: this was not an isolated lot or a highway, but a street of family homes, which is why a burst of more than 30 rounds endangered far more people than the two men who were hit.

The East Chicago killings were one of several deadly shootings across the United States over the Halloween weekend, including three shootings in Dallas's Deep Ellum district that left four people dead and about 15 injured. Read the Dallas Deep Ellum update

What happens next

The case is being investigated by the Joint Agency Homicide Task Force, the multi-agency unit that handles homicide investigations in the area, alongside East Chicago police. The next expected steps are the formal identification of the two men by the Lake County coroner's process, the recovery and review of security video from homes and businesses near the bar, and a police decision on whether any suspect description can be released. As of Sunday evening, November 1, no arrests had been announced and no motive had been given.

For Punjabi and South Asian families across Chicagoland and northwest Indiana — a region with long-established communities in and around Chicago, Hammond and Gary — the case is a reminder of how quickly a late-night dispute outside a bar can turn into gunfire on a residential street. Awaaz Punjab will update this story when police release the victims' names or announce an arrest.