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Gun used in deadly Chicago-area shootings has long history

CHICAGO (AP) — A gun that a man used to kill five people in January shootings in Chicago and a nearby suburb was used in as many five other shootings since 2009, according to a published report.

The Chicago Tribune reported Saturday that documents released to the paper in response to an open records request revealed that shell casings and ballistic tests were used in the other shootings on the city's South Side that left five people injured, though none died.

Jason Nightengale, 32, of Chicag o, used the weapon to shoot seven people over a period of four hours on Jan. 9, killing five of them, before officers in Evanston just north of the city killed him during a shootout.

The documents do not show how and when Nightengale obtained the .45-caliber Glock 21 semiautomatic handgun that he used to go on what police have called a random string of shootings. But they indicate that the gun was first used in a shooting a little more than two years after it was legally sold in late 2006 at Chuck's Gun Shop in the south suburb of Riverdale to a man in his late 20s, according to the paper.

Chicago Police have said for years that the guns they recovered in Chicago shootings were bought legally before they changed hands illegally among gang members and others. They say many of the guns can be traced to gun shops as close as the suburbs and as far away as Mississippi.

Just this week, authorities said that they had traced five guns used in a March 26 shooting on the city's South Side that left one man dead and seven more injured to gun dealers in Tennessee. Those weapons are at the center of an investigation that led to the arrest of three U.S. Army soldiers in Tennessee on charges of conspiring to buy firearms and then illegally selling them in Chicago. According to court records, guns linked to the soldiers were also used in a homicide in the city in February and another shooting on March 11.