A Chicago police officer shot and killed two people early Saturday while responding to a domestic disturbance call on the city's West Side, police said. Quintonio Legrier, a 19-year-old college student, was pronounced dead at a hospital at 4:51am and Bettie Jones, a 55-year-old mother of five who was Legrier's neighbor, died at a different hospital at 5:14am. The shootings happened around 4:25am after officers who responded to the call "were confronted by a combative subject," the Chicago Police Department said in a statement. NBC Chicago cites neighbors and relatives who say Legrier was threatening a male resident with a metal bat; a source tells the Tribune the man was his father.
Jones lived in a downstairs apartment in the same building and the Tribune's source says Legrier's father had asked her to look for the arriving police; sources say she was shot after she opened the door for police. Legrier's mother, Janet Cooksey, told the Chicago Tribune that her son was studying engineering at Northern Illinois University and "was going somewhere." Cooksey, who was not present at the time of the shooting, told the Tribune that her son had been dealing with mental issues, but "we're thinking the police are going to service us, take him to the hospital. They took his life," she said. She said her son "didn't have a gun. He had a bat." The Tribune points out the killings mark "the the first use of lethal force by Chicago police" since video of Laquan McDonald's death was released. (More Chicago stories.)