Midnight lock on Eddy Street. Nine murders. Still no Bissell shooter in custody.

South Bend County-City Building. Photo by Derek Jensen (Tysto) / Wikimedia Commons (public domain), 2005.

South Bend County-City Building. Photo by Derek Jensen (Tysto) / Wikimedia Commons (public domain), 2005.

Midnight on Eddy Street now means locked doors at O’Rourke’s Public House, Brothers Bar & Grill, Five Guys, and Dave’s Hot Chicken. Customers out. Bolts thrown. That is the new rule for businesses along the Notre Dame-adjacent strip, WNDU reported Thursday evening, Sept. 24.

A few blocks of St. Joseph County away, the shooter who killed three people on Bissell Street Saturday night is still free. South Bend police have logged nine murders so far this year. The city just told late-night merchants to lock up at midnight.

Zero injured last year. Five shot this year.

South Bend Police Department numbers, aired by WNDU, frame the Eddy Street flip in blunt terms. In 2025 the strip drew three gunfire-related calls — property damage, zero injured. In 2026, five people have been shot in four separate Eddy Street incidents. Management’s answer is a midnight close. Whether the rule holds on Notre Dame home-game nights was still unconfirmed in that WNDU report. Students quoted by the station split: one supported the earlier shutdown; another questioned it. The businesses themselves, WNDU said, were unable to comment.

Three names on Bissell. Tip line still ringing.

The body count that forced the mayor to the microphone is not abstract. Around 11:30 p.m. Saturday on the 1300 block of Bissell Street, Jo’Von Hopper, 18; Alaya Maez, 20; and Geimisha Broadnax, 22, were shot. Broadnax died of her injuries at a hospital, ABC57 reported. A neighbor told the station she is putting her home up for sale. City Councilmember Karen White, in a press release quoted by ABC57, pleaded with the community not to normalize the sound of gunfire. Tips go to 574-288-STOP. Police are still searching for the shooter.

Solve-rate talk. Empty handcuffs on Bissell.

Mayor James Mueller addressed the rising homicide tally and the recurrent Eddy Street violence that flares during football season, according to a separate WNDU report Thursday morning. South Bend Police say nine murders this year are already outpacing recent years. Mueller said the last couple of years were historically low for homicides and that the city was on pace until “this tragic weekend” with three lives lost. He touted a solve rate “in the 80s, 90s percent… well above the national average.” He also said no suspect is in custody on Bissell, that he will not share further suspect information yet, and that gun offenders in St. Joseph County and South Bend are “almost certainly going to get caught.”

On the public streets between Notre Dame’s private property and the secured Eddy Street game-day zone, Mueller blamed the state’s removal of tools that once let officers ask whether someone had the ability or permit to carry a firearm. He called that state policy a bad policy then and now — his attribution, not an independent finding. For Fusion Fest at Howard Park, he promised a no-tolerance posture, heavy police presence, and no weapons inside the event.

Lock the bars at midnight. Keep the tip line open. Count nine dead. The doors on Eddy Street will close on schedule. The Bissell Street case, as of Thursday night, has not.

Reporting: WNDU, Sept. 24, 2026 — Eddy Street businesses now required to close by midnight; WNDU, Sept. 24, 2026 — South Bend mayor addresses rising crime concerns and Fusion Fest safety plans; ABC57, Sept. 24, 2026 — Triple murder on Bissell Street.

Written by Hoosiers, for Hoosiers.