Chicago:Off-duty cop critically wounded; DCFS supervisor killed

A tow truck driver, right, prepares to tow the vehicle where two people were shot overnight. An off-duty Chicago police officer was critically wounded and a woman with him was killed when shots were fired into the vehicle. (Tribune photo by Chuck Berman / August 13, 2008)

Double shooting jolts quiet Chicago neighborhood
Off-duty cop critically wounded; DCFS supervisor killed
By Robert Mitchum, Azam Ahmed and David Heinzmann Chicago Tribune reporters
7:22 PM CDT, August 13, 2008



When residents on a quiet block of Franklin Boulevard in Chicago were awoken by shouting from a black sport-utility vehicle late Tuesday, they called police to complain about the noise, thinking it was another case of people drinking on the block.

About an hour and a half later, they were awakened again—this time by gunshots, loud, long blasts from a car horn and a man inside the SUV screaming, "Help me, I've been shot!"

When police arrived, they found Kathryn Romberg, 45, and Robert Soto, 49, an off-duty 23-year veteran of the Chicago police force, bleeding from gunshot wounds in what police call an attempted robbery. Romberg, who lived in an apartment only steps from where the vehicle was parked, was pronounced dead at the scene. Soto, a detective in the police bomb and arson division, remained in critical condition Wednesday night in Mt. Sinai Hospital.
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