CHICAGO (AP) – July in Chicago ended as it began: Mourning the death of a child whose only mistake was venturing outside to play when someone armed with a gun came to the neighborhood hunting for an enemy.
On Monday, two days after his department released statistics that revealed the month had been one of the deadliest in the history of the city, Police Superintendent David Brown repeated what has become a grim ritual of recounting the death of a child.
This time, the story was about Janari Ricks. “Nine years old, (he) was shot and killed while doing what every child in our city should able to do without a second thought … playing with friends on a warm summer evening just outside his front door,” said Brown. “Now, instead of planning for his future, Janari’s parents are arranging for their child’s funeral.”
His death underscores a surge in gun violence in the the United States that has been building all year.
In New York City, there have been 237 homicides in 2020 compared to 181 for the same period last year.