Ken Berwitz
Tyshawn Lee was not a thug. He wasn\’t waving a real or toy gun. He wasn\’t blasting a radio loud enough to precipitate an argument that turned fatal. As we now understand it, he was just a 9 year old kid, shot dead for the “crime” of being in the line of fire when other people started shooting guns at each other.
In Chicago alone,there have been well over 2,500 victims of gun violence so far this year. Thelatest, nine-year old Tyshawn Lee,was killed Monday afternoon.
“Please, put theguns down, please,” his mother, Karla Lee, pleaded. “Taking too manyyoung lives. Please.”
Tyshawn was shotmultiple times in the neck and head. Police don\’t know yet whether he was justin the wrong place at the wrong time or actually targeted in a gang feud.
“There was anunknown number of individuals gathered in the alley prior to theshooting,” said Dean Andrews, Chicago\’s chief of detectives. “Sometype of argument or altercation ensued, which was followed by gunfire.”
A police spokesmansaid while many in the community are helping them, the boy\’s father — a knowngang member — is not cooperating.
With 391 murders inChicago this year, the homicide rate is up 18 percent over a year ago — andthe victims include 40 children.
a) Tyshawn Lee wasn\’t just shot, he was shot multiple times in the neck and head – just as someone would be shot if it were done intentionally;b) his father is a known gang member, andc) his father – whom, in any normal situation would be overcome with grief and begging the police to find his son\’s killer – is refusing to cooperate with the police. Just what a gang member would do if an investigation would be damaging to him as a gang member.
