CHICAGO, IL – October 5, 2026 (STL.News) The broad-daylight stabbing death of a 7-year-old girl walking with her older sister on Chicago’s South Side has devastated her family and raised questions about how the woman now charged with killing her was handled during previous encounters with the Cook County criminal justice system.
Shavon Gayden, 48, has been charged with one felony count of first-degree murder in connection with the killing, according to Chicago police.
Police said the girl was walking near 86th Street and South Cottage Grove Avenue shortly before noon Saturday when a woman approached and stabbed her multiple times in the back with a sharp object.
The child was rushed to the University of Chicago’s Comer Children’s Hospital, where she was pronounced dead.
NBC Chicago identified the child as Eddimar Paola Hernández Chacón, citing the Cook County Medical Examiner’s Office. Other news organizations have used shortened or differently rendered versions of her name. This article refers to her as Eddimar, consistent with the name her family used in Chicago television reports.
Police have not announced a motive.
Gayden has been charged but has not been convicted. She is presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty in court.
Eddimar was walking with her sister
Eddimar was with her 16-year-old sister before the attack.
Ald. Michelle Harris, who represents Chicago’s 8th Ward, told NBC Chicago that the sisters had gone to a Boost Mobile store in the area to pay a phone bill.
Harris said a woman followed the sisters after they left the store.
NBC Chicago reported, citing police, that the woman who approached Eddimar did not know her. Authorities have not explained what allegedly prompted the attack.
Surveillance footage obtained by Chicago television stations shows Eddimar walking hand-in-hand with her older sister before the stabbing.
The attack occurred at approximately 11:55 a.m. Saturday in the 8600 block of South Cottage Grove Avenue.
Police said the woman approached Eddimar with a sharp object and stabbed her multiple times in the back.
People nearby quickly intervened.
Police said witnesses detained the alleged attacker until officers arrived. Gayden suffered injuries while being detained and was taken to a hospital with injuries that were not considered life-threatening.
Police subsequently took her into custody.
The Associated Press independently reported the basic sequence of events, including that the child was attacked while walking in front of businesses, stabbed multiple times in the back and taken to a hospital, where she died.
Community mourns 7-year-old girl
Eddimar’s family and members of the community returned Sunday to the area where she was attacked.
Family members, neighbors and community leaders gathered for a vigil near 86th Street and Cottage Grove Avenue and released white balloons in the child’s memory.
Her family remembered her as a happy child who enjoyed drawing and playing with her siblings.
ABC7 Chicago reported that Eddimar would wait near a window for her parents to return home.
Her stepfather, Pedro Izquierdo, described her as a happy child with dreams for her future.
Her mother, Estefany Hernandez, called publicly for justice for her daughter.
The killing has drawn particular attention because authorities have disclosed no apparent reason for Eddimar to have been targeted.
Police have not announced a motive.
Gayden had previous criminal cases
The investigation is now drawing attention to Gayden’s previous encounters with the Cook County criminal justice system.
CBS News Chicago reported that Gayden had been charged in at least four Cook County criminal cases since 2016.
According to CBS, two cases were dropped, while two convictions resulted in probation.
Her previous cases included a 2023 attack on a Chicago Transit Authority bus operator.
ABC7 Chicago separately reviewed court records and reported that Gayden was arrested in 2023 for attacking a CTA bus driver and was sentenced to two years of probation.
The following year, according to ABC7, records show Gayden violated probation after assaulting two shelter workers.
She received court supervision in that case.
ABC7 further reported that Gayden later failed to appear in court and that an arrest warrant was issued.
The station said Monday morning that it was unclear from the records it reviewed whether that warrant had been executed.
That warrant has become one of the most significant unanswered questions surrounding the case.
Report: Warrant remained active
CWBChicago published a more detailed account based on its review of Gayden’s court records.
According to the outlet, Gayden pleaded guilty in November 2024 to aggravated battery of a CTA bus driver and received two years of probation.
CWBChicago reported that she was arrested the following month again on misdemeanor battery and assault charges, resulting in a probation violation.
According to its review, Gayden failed to appear for a February 2025 status hearing in the probation matter, and an arrest warrant was issued.
The outlet reported that Gayden later appeared in court in July 2025 and pleaded guilty in the misdemeanor case, even though the earlier warrant was apparently still active.
Most significantly, CWBChicago reported that the warrant remained active in a police database when Gayden was arrested following Saturday’s fatal stabbing.
CBS News Chicago independently reported a similar issue, saying Gayden was processed and sentenced in a battery case while she was subject to an active arrest warrant but apparently was not taken back into custody on that warrant.
Together, those reports raise significant questions about how officials handled Gayden’s previous cases.
How did the warrant remain unresolved?
The available reporting does not yet establish which government agency, court official, or other entity was responsible for the apparent failure to resolve the warrant.
It also cannot be established that executing the warrant would have prevented Eddimar’s death.
But the reported chronology creates a legitimate public-accountability question.
Gayden had previous criminal cases.
She received probation.
Records reviewed by ABC7 indicate she later violated that probation.
She subsequently failed to appear in court, according to ABC7, resulting in an arrest warrant.
CWBChicago reports that the warrant remained active while Gayden later appeared in court in another matter.
CBS separately reports that she was processed and sentenced in a battery case while an active arrest warrant existed without apparently being taken back into custody.
Those facts require an explanation.
The central question is how someone reportedly subject to an active arrest warrant could pass through another part of the criminal justice system without that warrant apparently being resolved.
Until Cook County authorities explain what happened, responsibility for what occurred in that process cannot be conclusively assigned to a specific individual or agency.
Additional details emerge about attack
CWBChicago also reported additional details from what it described as a preliminary Chicago police report.
According to the outlet, investigators recovered two knives from Gayden’s purse.
A third knife, believed to have been used in the attack, was reportedly recovered between the location where Eddimar was stabbed and the location where witnesses detained Gayden.
CWBChicago also reported that witnesses pursued Gayden following the stabbing and that one man knocked her unconscious before police took her into custody.
Those details have not all appeared in the more limited public accounts released by Chicago police and therefore remain attributed to CWBChicago’s reporting.
Police have confirmed that bystanders detained the woman and that she suffered non-life-threatening injuries before being taken into custody.
Earlier confrontation reported
Investigators are also examining what happened immediately before the stabbing.
ABC7 Chicago reported that Gayden allegedly became involved in an altercation with employees at a nearby wireless store before the attack.
Harris said Eddimar and her sister had been in the area to pay a phone bill.
Authorities have not publicly established whether the reported confrontation involving Gayden had any connection to the subsequent attack on Eddimar.
Police have not announced a motive.
The earlier confrontation therefore does not establish why Eddimar was allegedly attacked.
Mayor Brandon Johnson responds
Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson issued a statement Sunday following Eddimar’s death.
Johnson said he was heartbroken by the killing and expressed condolences to the girl’s family and the Chatham community.
“No family should ever have to experience the unimaginable pain of losing a child, and no child should ever have to fear for her life simply walking through her neighborhood,” Johnson said.
The mayor said the city would continue working with the Chicago Police Department as the investigation proceeds.
The killing comes amid an existing political debate in Chicago over crime, policing and public safety.
Currently available reporting does not establish that Johnson was responsible for decisions involving Gayden’s probation, previous prosecutions, or the reported outstanding warrant.
The documented accountability question concerns how Gayden moved through the Cook County criminal justice system while, according to CBS News Chicago and CWBChicago, an arrest warrant remained active.
Determining responsibility will require examining the agencies and court procedures involved.
Criminal history receives new scrutiny
FOX 32 Chicago also reviewed Gayden’s arrest history and reported that Chicago Police Department records show several previous arrests between 2016 and 2024.
The listed allegations included domestic battery, aggravated battery involving a transit employee, and aggravated assault involving a peace officer, firefighter, or emergency worker.
An arrest history alone does not establish guilt in each underlying case.
CBS’s examination provides additional context by reporting that two of Gayden’s Cook County cases were dropped and that two convictions resulted in probation.
The distinction is important when examining someone’s criminal history: arrests, charges and convictions are not interchangeable.
What is relevant to the current accountability question is that Gayden had repeated contact with the criminal justice system before Saturday’s killing and that multiple Chicago news organizations have identified questions surrounding an apparently unresolved warrant.
Murder case moves to court
Gayden was due in court Monday for a detention hearing.
ABC7 reported Monday morning that she remained hospitalized at the time of its last check.
CBS similarly reported that Gayden was due for a detention hearing in Cook County Criminal Court.
The proceedings are expected to provide additional information about prosecutors’ allegations and may eventually clarify portions of Gayden’s criminal history.
Prosecutors will have to prove the first-degree murder charge beyond a reasonable doubt.
Police have not publicly announced a motive for the stabbing.
Two questions now face authorities
Eddimar’s killing leaves authorities confronting two separate matters.
The first is the murder investigation and prosecution. Investigators and prosecutors must establish exactly what happened Saturday morning and prove their criminal case against Gayden.
The second concerns what happened before Saturday.
Court records and reporting indicate Gayden had previous criminal cases, received probation, later violated it, and failed to appear in court.
ABC7 confirms that a warrant was issued.
CWBChicago reports that the warrant remained active until Saturday.
CBS reports that Gayden was processed and sentenced in another case while she was subject to an active arrest warrant but apparently was not taken back into custody.
Those reports do not prove that Eddimar’s death would have been prevented had Gayden been arrested earlier.
They do establish a legitimate reason to examine how authorities handled the warrant.
If the warrant remained active while Gayden later appeared before the criminal justice system, Cook County authorities face an important question about how that happened and whether existing procedures worked as intended.
A family waits for justice
For Eddimar’s family, those institutional questions follow an unimaginable loss.
The 7-year-old was walking with her older sister through a neighborhood commercial district shortly before noon Saturday.
Police say a woman approached and stabbed her repeatedly in the back.
Witnesses immediately intervened and detained the alleged attacker.
But Eddimar could not be saved.
Her family gathered the following day near the place where she died, releasing balloons and remembering a child who loved to draw, play with her siblings and wait for her parents to return home.
The criminal case will now move through the Cook County court system.
At the same time, the reported warrant history creates a separate question Chicago and Cook County authorities may be called upon to answer:
Why did an arrest warrant reportedly remain active despite Gayden’s subsequent contact with the criminal justice system?
The evidence currently available does not establish who caused that apparent breakdown.
But reporting based on court records gives authorities sufficient reason to explain what happened.
A 7-year-old girl is dead.
A woman with previous criminal cases is charged with murdering her.
And there are now documented questions about whether an outstanding arrest warrant should have resulted in the accused woman being taken into custody before Saturday’s killing.
Those questions deserve factual answers.
Editor’s note: Shavon Gayden has been charged with first-degree murder. Criminal charges and allegations are not proof of guilt. Gayden is presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty in court. Information concerning her previous criminal cases and reported outstanding arrest warrant is attributed to reporting and court-record reviews by ABC7 Chicago, CBS News Chicago, and CWBChicago. The investigation and criminal proceedings remain ongoing.
