ALSIP, IL — A man accused of fatally shooting the host of a backyard barbecue in 2017 was arrested Tuesday in Alsip by U.S. Marshalls. Antonio Dickerson, 24, appeared Thursday before Cook County Judge Kelly McCarthy on charges of first-degree murder, attempted first-degree murder and aggravated battery with a firearm.
Dickerson was 17 at the time of the incident in August 2017 necessitating an automatic juvenile transfer.
On Aug. 8, 2017, the host, Alfred Mitchell Jr., was hosting a barbecue at 63 E. 37th Place attended by many adults and children. Dickerson and two unknown accomplices were captured on a video cutting through an apartment complex less moments before the shooting walking toward 37th Place and Michigan Avenue, prosecutors said.
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Another guest and witness had briefly left the barbecue to visit a friend. When they were walking back to the party, prosecutors said they noticed Dickerson and his friends following them. Another witness sitting in his vehicle on Michigan Avenue said he also saw Dickerson and his friends following the guests.
The guest warned Mitchell that she had been followed. Minutes later, the witness sitting in his vehicle saw Dickerson and his friends walk to the corner of 37th and Michigan, brandish firearms and start firing into the group at the barbecue. The guest heard the gunfire and looked at the corner and recognized Dickerson as one of the three shooters, prosecutors said.
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The alleged shooters fled. Mitchell suffered a gunshot wound to the flank. The party guest, a woman, was shot in the leg. Four other women were wounded, including a grandmother who was shot in her buttocks while shielding her grandchildren from the gunfire. Another guest who suffered a gunshot wound in the leg died in 2023 unrelated to the shooting.
Mitchell was taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital, where he died from his injury.
Chicago police recovered 21 shell casings, including two 40.-caliber casings, twelve 45-caliber shell casings and seven 380 caliber shell casings at the scene. The female guest brought a Facebook photo of Dickerson to police, who were able to identify Dickerson, prosecutors said.
In 2022, the man who was sitting in his vehicle came forward with his eyewitness account while incarcerated at Cook County Jail. Prosecutors said he positively identified Dickerson in a photo array as one the three shooters. According to court documents, the witness’s detailed account was corroborated by other witnesses and surveillance video.
Prosecutors said other witnesses and police, who knew Dickerson well, also positively identified him from the apartment complex surveillance videos.
A week after the shooting on Aug. 15, 2017, prosecutors said someone turned in a 40-caliber gun to Chicago police. Ballistics analysis indicated that the two 40-caliber casings recovered from the shooting were fired from the gun.
Another person arrested in Evanston for gun possession in September 2017, specifically a .45-caliber firearm, had also been used in the shooting. The 380-caliber gun used in the shooting has not yet been recovered, prosecutors said.
An arrest warrant was issued for Dickerson, who was taken into custody Tuesday in the 11800 block of South Karlov Avenue in Alsip, his last known address. Prosecutors said Dickerson identified himself in the apartment complex surveillance video, but told police he had been at a third witness’s residence at the time of the shooting.
A witness positively identified Dickerson from the surveillance video and told police she had not seen him three hours prior to the shooting, court documents said.
Prosecutors told the judge Dickerson satisfactorily completed two years’ probation for a 2019 possession of a motor vehicle conviction. He was also charged in 2018 with obstructing identification and has two bond forfeitures.
Judge McCarthy ordered Dickerson to be detained following his pretrial hearing at the Leighton Criminal Courts Building. Dickerson’s next court date is April 16 at 26th and California.
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