Childhood home of Jennifer Hudson showcases one of America's most violent neighbourhoods ahead of trial in 2008 triple murder
- Relatives of American Idol finalist shot dead at Chicago home in 2008
- Oscar-winner may testify at murder trial of William Balfour, which begins this week
- Number of homicides in Chicago has climbed 60 per cent in the first three months of 2012
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The house is like many others nearby.
Blinded by boards over windows after witnessing the worst kind of violence, the white two-story house, its paint chipped and its front steps crumbling, sits vacant behind a rusty iron fence that separates an overgrown yard from the cracked sidewalk.
About the only difference between it and thousands of boarded-up buildings in Chicago's most notorious neighborhood is that Oscar-winning actress and singer Jennifer Hudson grew up here - and her mother, brother and nephew died here, allegedly gunned down by Hudson's brother-in-law, a known gang member.
Horror house: The former home of Jennifer Hudson is boarded up in the Englewood neighborhood of Chicago after the murder of her mother, brother and nephew
That and the shrine of teddy bears, candles and flowers was bigger than others that sprout up on these blocks when life ends violently.
When the trial of William Balfour begins Monday in the 2008 killings, it will be an all-too-familiar story of death and violence in Englewood on the city's South Side.
Hudson’s mother Darnell Hudson Donerson, 57, and older brother Jason, 29, were found dead at the family’s home on Chicago’s south side in 2008.
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ShareThe singer then offered $100,000 for her missing nephew Julian King's safe return. The child's body was found three days later in a vehicle on the city’s west side with multiple gun shot wounds.
Ms Hudson is on the witness list for the trial of her sister's estranged husband William Balfour who is accused of killing her family.
At a time when cities across the country have seen the number of homicides fall, sometimes dramatically, Chicago's jumped by a whopping 60 per cent the first three months of the year, and Englewood's violence was a big reason why.
Charged: William Balfour is set to go on trial this week in the murders of Jennifer Hudson's mother Darnell Hudson Donerson, older brother Jason and nephew Julian King
Trial: William Balfour will be tried for murder starting this week at the Cook County courthouse, shown here
The 15 slayings there in 2012 are nearly double the number reported during the same period a year ago.
Last year, not only did the number jump to 60 from 40 the previous year, but the total number of homicides reported in this roughly 20-by-20 block community was more than half as many reported for the entire city of Washington, D.C. and a little less than a third of Houston's total for the year.
'It happens here all the time,' said Jean Carter-Hill, a community activist whose group helps children and families. 'I can't even run to all these funerals, it's just too many, looking at all these dead people in caskets all the time.'
In Chicago, Englewood has become synonymous with street crime.
Since he took office last May, Mayor Rahm Emanuel has used the word 'Englewood' as almost shorthand for gangs, guns and the dangers facing the city's children.
Warnings: Jennifer Hudson has told investigators in the murder case that she had misgivings about Balfour
But the deteriorating neighborhood has presented him with one of his biggest challenges, becoming a focus for his promise to deploy more police officers to the street while cracking down on Englewood's gangs.
'The mayor says very publicly that a murder in Englewood is a murder in the city of Chicago [and] just because it happened there it is not OK,' said Police Supt Garry McCarthy, in an AP interview.
'People feel abandoned in those neighborhoods and we are saying you are not abandoned.'
Residents say they've seen police commanders and anti-gang initiatives come and go over the years, and the neighborhood just gets more violent and the criminals more brazen.
Just as in years past when public housing residents slept in their bathtubs to protect them from the bullets that pierced their walls, residents say the fear of gun battles has pushed some of them deep into their homes and away from their windows where they could be hit by stray bullets.
'People don't give a damn, they just shoot you across the street, they come into your house and shoot you,' said 80-year-old Homer Wright, who made headlines this month after shooting a teenager who allegedly broke into his tavern, where he'd taken to sleeping to prevent break-ins.
The authorities dropped charges against Wright but confiscated the handgun he owned illegally for self-protection.
Harrowing: Jennifer Hudson poses with her Oscar in 2008 and brother-in-law William Balfour. She's expected to testify at his murder trial over the shootings of her mother, brother and nephew
Murder trial: William Balfour is the estranged husband of Jennifer Hudson's sister Julia. He is accused of killing her mother, brother and nephew four years ago
Protection: Homer Wright made headlines this month after shooting a teen who allegedly broke into his tavern, where he'd taken to sleeping to prevent break-ins
There are a host of reasons for Englewood's downward spiral. But they mostly boil down to an exodus of families from an area that was predominantly single-family homes, resulting in an explosion in the number of abandoned buildings, and an influx of gang members.
Home to 100,000 residents in 1960, Englewood's population has dwindled.
It had dropped to about 40,000 in 2000 and to 30,000 just 10 years later.
Part of the reason, Carter-Hill and others say, is that families moved out to safer places and others lost their homes when they lost jobs during the recession.
According to the police department, there are more than 4,100 abandoned buildings in Englewood, nearly 600 of them vacated in just the last 15 months.
Troubled relationship: Jennifer Hudson's sister Julia with her estranged husband William Balfour who is standing trial for murdering her relatives
One study found more vacant homes in Englewood and the community to the immediate west than anywhere in Chicago.
It all has created an atmosphere ripe for a category of people nobody wanted to see: Gang members who left the city's torn-down public housing high rises and found the abandoned houses magnets for crime.
'We've seen gangs come in, run cords from the house next door for electrical service and make it look like a regular house and they're using it as a gang house,' said Leo Schmitz, commander of Englewood's police district.
Moore said the Hudson family still owns their now-empty house, but they've apparently stopped trying to remodel it after vandals broke in at least twice to steal construction materials.
Abandoned: Antie Moore, pictured, says the Hudson family still owns the house, but have stopped trying to remodel it after vandals broke in at least twice to steal construction materials
Close ties: Jennifer Hudson offered $100,000 for the safe return of her nephew Julian King, seven (left). His body was found in an SUV with multiple gunshot wounds in October 2008
Murdered: The singer's mother Darnell Hudson Donerson (left) and older brother Jason (right) were shot dead in the family's home on the south side of Chicago
He sees Hudson's sister come by once in a while, but hasn't seen Jennifer Hudson, who even after she became famous came by to talk with people and even jump rope with kids outside.
But he does see gangbangers on the street all day, every day.
Among those, authorities said, was Balfour, the suspect in the Hudson family slayings.
While prosecutors say the killings had a domestic motive, tied to his deteriorating marriage to the singer's sister, his life story is a familiar one in Englewood.
A high school drop-out, Balfour was a member of the Gangster Disciples and had a long rap sheet for drug offenses, stealing cars and ultimately a seven-year stint in prison for attempted murder and vehicular manslaughter.
A little more than two years after his release, he was behind bars again, charged with first-degree murder in the deaths of Hudson's mother, brother and 7-year-old nephew.
McCarthy said the Englewood gangs are more rigid and territorial than the gangs he saw when he was a ranking member of the police department in New York and chief in Newark, New Jersey.
Tragedy: Tributes lie outside the home in the Englewood neighbourhood of Chicago where Jennifer Hudson's mother and brother were shot dead
That means a rival gang member on a street where the drug trade is controlled by another gang can mean only one thing: Likely gunfire.
In response, Schmitz said he has ordered intelligence about gangs distributed to all police officers, not just the anti-gang squad.
And he's ordered officers out of their cars and walking the community more than ever before - a practice Carter-Hill said is necessary to build trust where there has long been suspicion of police.
Antie Moore, who lives a few doors down from the Hudson house, said he thinks things have gotten worse since the national media arrived to interview people after the killings.
A city clean-up crew came a few days ago, but Moore suspects it had more to do with news crews' return ahead of the trial than anything else.
'They only cleaned up the alley behind [the Hudson house] and a little bit of the lot next to it,' he said.
Then, he said, 'They left.'
Devastating: The SUV, where the body of seven-year-old Julian King was found with gunshot wounds, is removed from a Chicago street
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