This Chicago Tribune investigative report, published September 24, 2021 by reporters Annie Sweeney and Jeremy Gorner, examines how four handguns stolen from Superior Shooters Supply in Superior, Wisconsin, on New Year’s Day 2016 were later linked to at least 35 Chicago shootings, including three homicides. The article reconstructs the burglary carried out by Dexter Leddy, who later pled no contest to felony theft, and follows the path of a 9 mm Glock 17 connected to 27 shootings—the most of any single gun tracked by Chicago police in recent years.

Through interviews, records, and law-enforcement data, the piece shows how stolen or straw-purchased firearms from Wisconsin and Indiana feed Chicago’s illegal gun market. It also details the personal toll on victims’ families, including those of Elliott Brown and other South Side residents, and the emotional aftermath for gun-shop owner Patricia Kukull, whose stolen weapons fueled tragic violence hundreds of miles away.