Blood-soaked Chicago prepares to host the DNC after 11 people shot over the weekend as local businesses are boarded up

Chicago law enforcement are bracing for a hostile week at the Democratic National Convention as the city still reels from a crime-riddled weekend. 

At least 11 people were shot across Chicago over the weekend, including three fatally, as yet another weekend of violence gripped the city. 

With police resources already stretched, the anticipation of protests and potential looting has seen a number of businesses board up their facades. 

Tens of thousands of protestors are expected to take to the streets throughout the DNC, and although Chicago officials have approved a 'March on the DNC' rally near to the convention, Mayor Brandon Johnson insisted that the city will be prepared. 

Over the weekend of violence before the DNC starts on Tuesday, over a dozen people were shot - including at least two officer-involved shootings involving Chicago police. 

The latest occurred shortly after midnight on Sunday in the Pilsen neighborhood, when officers with the force's Robbery Task Force raced to a residential street after hearing multiple gunshots. 

Upon arrival, cops shot one armed assailant, who died later at hospital, while two victims were found inside a vehicle with gunshot wounds close to where officers heard the gunshots from. 

It came just over a day after an officer also fired into a vehicle wanted in connection to a homicide, at a time when Chicago cops were stretched thin across the city dealing with violence. 

Hours after that officer-involved-shooting, a 28-year-old man was shot and killed in the city's Bronzeville neighborhood, when an unidentified gunman fired at him walking on the sidewalk before speeding away. 

And just outside Chicago's United Center stadium where Kamala Harris will officially accept the Democratic nomination for president, a man was left in critical condition after being shot by the event space on Sunday morning. 

It came after he was injured in a crash by the stadium's north side, which led the driver of a car he crashed into to fire several shots into his car. 

The weekend of bloody violence was far from a departure for Chicago, with 33 people shot through the weekend before, cops said. 

Despite the city being gripped by crime, city officials have sanctioned at least seven large demonstrations, with the focus expected to fall on the Israel-Hamas war. 

Hatem Abudayyeh, the national chair of the US Palestinian Community Network that is organizing the protests, said the group is still dissatisfied with Kamala Harris' stance on the conflict. 

'Harris represents the administration; she represents Biden,' he said. 'We’re not going to do anything different. We’re going to mobilize.' 

He added to the Washington Post: 'Our target is the Democratic Party and the leadership of the party and ‘Killer Kamala’ is one of them.' 

As anxiety builds ahead of the convention, Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson, who is slated to speak at the DNC, insisted that his city will be able to handle the protests. 

'There’s a reason why Time Out magazine rated the city of Chicago the best for conventions, because we’re good at it,' he said at a press conference on Friday. 

'Are there individuals out there that want to disrupt the beauty of Chicago? Of course there are.' 

The city allowed the scheduled protests amid mounting pressure from First Amendment rights groups, and the FBI said that it is 'not aware of any specific and articulable threats related to the DNC.'