Chicago ? Police confirmed Friday they found the gun used in the killings of Oscar-winning actress Jennifer Hudson’s mother, brother and nephew, as the family’s South Side community prepared a public memorial to say goodbye.

The .45-caliber gun was discovered Wednesday in a vacant lot in the West Side neighborhood where the body of Hudson’s 7-year-old nephew, Julian King, was found a few days earlier inside an SUV. The bodies of Hudson’s 57-year-old mother, Darnell Donerso, and her 29-year-old brother, Jason Hudson, were discovered in the family’s home last Friday.

A police official has said detectives think Hudson’s nephew was alive when he left the house where his relatives were killed and likely was shot in the SUV where his body was found. The police official, speaking on condition of anonymity because the official was not authorized to discuss the case publicly, would not elaborate on when detectives think the boy might have died.