An overnight shift spent reporting crime in Chicago

It’s just before 10 a.m., and I should be tired. Exhausted, even. But I’m not.

I woke up about 16 hours ago, and worked for 11 of them. I returned home an hour ago, ate dinner and got ready for bed. But right now, the sunlight is bouncing off the walls of my apartment, warming the chill of my unit that still lingers from last night. I slid my windows up and open before I walked out my door at 8 last night, and I’m thankful I did. The cold is refreshing.

Last night was an unusual night at work in that I stepped out from behind my standing desk and its four screens — equipped with internal CMS programs, Chartbeat, analytics software, Tweetdeck, emails, Slack chats, cable news, etc. — and hopped into the passenger seat of a pool car, shadowing a Chicago Tribune overnight reporter for an almost 11-hour overnight shift spent following gunshot victims, making midnight calls to public information officers, chatting with witnesses and drinking plenty of coffee.

The scene from a drive-by shooting in Chicago’s South Shore neighborhood. A teenage boy was fatally shot at about 11:15 p.m. in front of an elementary school on the 6900 block of South East End Avenue.

My ex-boyfriend Armando, who I still have the utmost respect and admiration for, worked overnights as a photographer on-and-off throughout the two years we dated. Many other colleagues I think highly of — some of whom I would consider to be friends — have cycled through the shift throughout my three years at the Tribune.

For the past several years, I’ve come into the newsroom at 6 a.m. to work on content created by our overnight reporters and photographers. I’ll say “good evening” and pour my morning coffee as they say “good morning” over mugs of evening tea. Naturally, after years of the curiosity that comes with frequent exposure, it made sense to see firsthand what went into making that content.

I went through a long chain of emails, CCing bosses and bosses bosses to get permission. I was sized for a bulletproof vest (reporters and photographers wear them on scenes) and went through the briefings and safety precautions.

I spent Thursday napping, woke in the evening, poured a large cup of coffee and headed downtown to shadow reporter Hannah Leone Thursday night into Friday morning.

She started her shift with data entry, using Chicago police data to update the Tribune’s crime databases. Afterward, we got into a pool car and went to report on the first incident of the evening, in which a 45-year-old man was fatally shot in the back of the head.

At that point Hannah said it was too late to head to the scene, so we went straight to the trauma center he had reportedly been taken to, hoping to find family members that would be willing to talk for a story. At that point, Hannah received a call about a 15-year-old who was shot in the groin outside an elementary school. We left the hospital to head to the scene, where Hannah talked to witnesses who obliged questions, but didn’t want to give names or talk on the record.

We went back to the trauma center afterward to see if, again, the victim’s family members would be willing to speak with us.

The trauma center was quiet and family members were nowhere to be found, so Hannah took some time to file story updates, keeping Tribune readers online abreast of everything that was going on in her evening.

I was amazed at Hannah’s eye for detail and ability to multitask. She effortlessly flicked through zones on the two police scanners she carried with her, lifting them from the pool car’s center console to her ear on occasion. She memorized quotes from witnesses who grew cold at the sight of a reporter’s notebook, and colored her stories with observations from each scene she went to — teens on powder-blue rental bikes, children hugging dogs, women carrying grocery bags.

The evening was pretty tame, after an eventful start. We spent most of the evening driving around, heading to incidents as they were reported on the scanners, waiting in hospital parking lots for family members and flicking through press releases, tweets, emails and texts from sources.

At about 5 a.m., we headed back downtown to the newsroom so Hannah could update our databases once again, and file her full stories from the evening.

Here are Hannah’s stories:

I’m really glad I made the time — and interrupted my sleep schedule! — to tag along with Hannah for one of her shifts. I think it’s really important for journalists to get a feel for the communities they cover, even the journalists that do the website and in-office stuff, like me.

I don’t think overnight crime reporting is quite the career path I’m interested in, but it was definitely a great experience that only makes me respect and admire our breaking news reporters more.