A woman on her way to work was killed when her car collided with a police SUV that was pursuing a suspect in the South Shore neighborhood on the South Side this morning, authorities said.
The two officers were hurt but their injuries were not considered life-threatening, authorities said. Police said the suspect was later taken into custody, but no details were available.
The accident happened about 10:20 a.m. in the 7600 block of South Yates Boulevard, said Police News Affairs Officer John Mirabelli.
The officers were pursuing a suspect from an incident nearby, at 78th Street and Ellis Avenue, when their squad car collided with a Pontiac driven by Jacqueline Reynolds, in her 50s, according to police and relatives.
The woman and the officers were taken to taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital, where Reynolds was pronounced dead.
"We don't know why the police did what they did," Reynolds' sister-in-law Cheryl Tisby said as he headed to Northwestern. "We lost another soldier."
Reynolds lived in a third-floor apartment at 76th Street and Phillips Avenue, a few blocks from the accident.
Tisha Hopson was in her third-floor apartment at 76th Street and Phillips Avenue when she heard what sounded like a shots. She went downstairs and saw about five squad cars speeding east down 76th Street.
"I thought it was gunshots. So I was going to run into my (apartment) because I'm worried about my own safety," said Hopson, 27. "When I was in the (apartment) all you hear is a big boom, like it's a bomb, or something that went off."
The front and driver's side of Reynolds' blue Pontiac was smashed in and rested along a patch of grass at the corner of 76th and Yates Boulevard. The squad car's front end was also smashed in, an airbag deployed on the driver's side. A rear tire was flat.
Another car blocked 76th Street with minor front-end damage. Police cordoned off the site with yellow and red tape.
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McClatchy-Tribune News Service
