Evanston police are calling a shooting early Saturday morning near the Howard Street CTA station the latest result of gang activity near the Chicago-Evanston border.

A 20-year-old man was walking just after 1 a.m. in the 7700 block of North Paulina Street when several males approached him on foot and opened fire, Chicago Police News Affairs Officer Stacey Cooper said.

The man suffered a graze wound to his right leg and was taken to St. Francis Hospital, where he was treated and released, Cooper said.

The Evanston Police Department said Thursday in its weekly newsletter the shooting stems from gang activity that “continues to percolate outside Evanston borders.” The man who was shot is a gang member, according to police.

The shooting happened in Chicago’s Rogers Park neighborhood, which has had 17 victims of gun violence, including three who died, so far this year, according to data compiled by the Chicago Tribune. The same data shows the neighborhood saw 20 shooting victims in 2013.

Chicago Ald. Joe Moore (49th)has attributed most of the recent shootings to a long-running dispute between two factions of a gang.

“Police are not certain what precipitated the most recent escalation of violence, but note that taunting among the rival factions in the social media appears to have escalated the conflict,” Moore wrote in an April 17 letter to constituents.

Evanston police have said they are ramping up their presence near the Chicago border and working closely with Chicago police to combat the gun violence. Discussing the departments’ collaboration last month, Evanston Police Cmdr. Jay Parrott said although Chicago and Evanston are two different cities, “crime doesn’t abide by that border.”

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