A 15-year-old boy was killed after he was shot 24 times just around the block from his home.
“Baby took five bullets to the face. He’s shot everywhere from his feet to the crown of his head. What type of animal does that?” said Brandy Martin, the boy’s aunt, and guardian.
The aunt, overwhelmed with emotions after returning from the medical examiner’s office, identified her young nephew as Sincere Cole.
“My nephew got the look on his face when he died! Help! You see it in his face!” Martin said.
It occurred near a Shell gas station on West 67th Street and South Western Avenue just before 7:00 p.m. on Saturday night.
Ralph Kendall, who works at the gas station, said he was the last person to see him alive.
“I heard shots, but I hear that all the time,” Kendall said. “And he took his last breath.”
The child’s death was just another fatal blow for his family. His mother, Felon Smith, was struck and killed by a CTA Red Line train in 2019 while trying to get her phone.
Three days after that, his cousin, who was Martin’s daughter, was shot and killed.
Both murders remain unsolved, leaving Martin feeling hopeless and thinking that justice may never come.
“I’m a mother of a child killed by gun violence. I’m an aunt of a nephew killed by gun violence. I want somebody to feel like I feel!” the aunt said.
Opinion it is sad but black people have become aware that our lives don’t matter. It is sad we have both police and citizens killing off our people like animals to the slaughter. I don’t know where to start but whatever it is we are in a heap of a mess. Black-on-black crime and young people are out of had we can not keep ignoring it like it does not matter. People get killed but not with so many people ignoring the deaths and it is sad as hell. What can we do right about it? We need people charged for the murders maybe 100,000 rewards upon conviction for leads. Money will make these people give up these killers. Maybe bounty hunters can find these men. But missing black boys and girls is not what our society deems as valuable. I am sad to the core. It’s just another story and a mother’s pain you can hear it in her voice. Black she not be the most policed and the least murders solved something not right.
