The playground, benches and sidewalks at Rand Grove Village are all empty; the entire courtyard is quiet, completely vacant, Tuesday afternoon.
“They are afraid,” one woman said as she scurried from her car to the front door of her apartment building. “People think something is going to happen and no one wants to get caught in the middle of it.”
In fear of her own safety, the resident asked to remain anonymous, “I can’t risk it,” the woman said. “There are a lot of gang members who live out here and it’s just too dangerous.”
A resident at Rand Grove Village for less than a year, the mother of four said she’s already seen too much violence at the apartment complex. “There was a gang fight not even a week ago, and then another just the other day, right where Corey got stabbed, there was a gang fight.” And now, the woman said she believes things at Rand Grove Village are about to get a whole lot worse.
against the 22-year-old man who stabbed and killed,, residents fear Frazier’s friends will try to retaliate. “I don’t want to know what could happen to me or my kids if we stay here any longer," the woman said.
On Sunday, Aug. 19, 21-year-old Corey Frazier was stabbed to death in the courtyard at the 700 block of E. Rand Grove Lane in Palatine. Ruled an act of self-defense, the Cook County Assistant State’s Attorney’s Office decided not to file charges in Frazier’s death.
“It’s very concerning,” the woman said Frazier was her neighbor, “I never thought a murder would happen so close.” While she never expected something like this to happen, the woman said with the amount of violence she has seen at the complex, no one should be surprised.
The woman said she's lost all hope, “This has been going on for months and now someone is dead, it’s really sad.” According to the woman, Frazier and the man who stabbed him had been feuding for months.
According to the Palatine Police Department, the victim, Frazier make repeated threats to physically harm the 22-year-old man who stabbed and killed Frazier Sunday night.
“The police are out here all the time but nothing seems to get done,” the woman said the violence out there has only escalated. “There has been a lot of stuff that has happened this year and no one has done anything about it,” the woman said, “The managers here don’t care, that’s obvious.”
Surveillance cameras are located inside the apartment buildings at Rand Grove Village but there are no cameras on the outside of the buildings, where residents said most of the violence occurs. The Rand Grove Village property manager declined to comment on the stabbing or the amount of violent crime that takes place at Rand Grove Village.
After Sunday night’s deadly stabbing and Tuesday’s ruling to not press charges, the woman said she has no choice, “Now I know I have to move, I’ve got to get out of this danger zone.”
