County commissioners honor State Street Bridge hero

December 31, 2011 – One of three people who helped a man shot on the State Street Bridge last August was honored recently by the Cook County Board of Commissioners. Shane Carroll, a 20-year-old cadet at New Mexico Military Institute, in Chicago on August 8 to visit relatives, was recognized at the December 14 board meeting.

According to a resolution sponsored by Robert Steel, county commissioner for the 2nd District, which includes downtown Chicago, Carroll was walking on the State Street Bridge with his mother, Ann, when a gunman shot 29-year-old Todd Brown, a dishwasher at Smith & Wollensky, “point blank in the head.”

While Ann called 911, Shane “immediately administered first aid to the victim, taking off his shirt and using it to apply pressure to the victim’s wound.”

He also noted the gunman’s appearance and was able to help police re-enact the crime.

(Left) Shane Carroll, who will graduate in 2012 from New Mexico Military Institute.

“Mr. Carroll’s swift response, bravery and indispensably skilled first aid are to be commended,” reads the resolution. “Mr. Carroll serves as a role model for other cadets and as an inspiration to us all. [His] actions are those of a hero, and he is to be celebrated as such.”

Brown, who has a lengthy criminal record and was shot once before, was taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital in serious condition. Although he was shot in the head, the bullet lodged in skin and did not pass into his skull.

According to Chicago Tribune columnist John Kass, another witness, Kyle Smith, a 36-year-old police officer in West Chester, Ohio, in Chicago for a job interview with the FBI, also performed first aid on the victim.

Shane and his mother had just stepped onto the bridge from the south end. Ann was ahead of Shane, walking north, and ahead of her were Brown and a man who came up behind Brown with a handgun and shot him.

“He dropped down like a brick,” Carroll told the Tribune. “He fell straight down on his head and he wasn’t moving at all at first.”

The gunman, described as a black male, about 25 years old, six feet two inches tall, 170 pounds, with black hair, went to the south end of the bridge, turned left, and ran east on Wacker Drive. According to a spokesperson, as of Wednesday morning Chicago police do not have anyone in custody or any suspects.

Shane is the son of a county supervisor in Arizona, Ray Carroll, who attended the board meeting in Cook County at which the resolution was read. Also attending was Colonel George Brick, Shane’s commanding officer at New Mexico Military Institute.