Media Justice Blog

Teen fatally shot at house party

June 14, 2010 - no comments

A 15-year-old boy was shot and killed after a bullet flew through an apartment window over the weekend.

Tags: 15-19, ABC local, African American, CPS, Englewood, gresham, gun violence, harper high school, june 2010, male, murder, no arrest, police involvement, street violence

Wounded: Stop the Violence

June 14, 2010 - no comments

Video interviews of youth survivors of gun violence

Tags: 15-19, African American, community involvement, CPS, Englewood, gun violence, hispaniclatino, kenwood high school, male, murder, pilsen, police involvement, washington heights, youth voices

Father Plefger and Annette Nance-Holt interview

June 14, 2010 - 1 Comment

Father Plefger and Annette Nance-Holt speak about their violence prevention efforts.

Tags: African American, church involvement, community involvement, female, gang violence, gun violence, male, murder, parent involvement, south side, street violence

CPS anti-violence program takes off, slowly

June 03, 2010 - no comments

As CJ lay in a hospital last winter nursing a gunshot wound to his arm, the prospect of graduating from high school seemed a distant dream for the skinny Roseland teen. Mostly left to his own devices, he had drifted to the streets at an early age and often skipped school, since attending class required crossing a web of gang lines that conflicted with his own affiliations.
Five months later, CJ rarely misses a day, participates in class and is on track to graduate. He credits his turnaround to an ambitious program launched by Chicago Public Schools this school year to stem youth violence.

Tags: chicago tribune, church involvement, CPS, Farragut Career Academy, gang violence, government involvement, gun violence, Hyde Park high, invisible boundaries, june 2010, male, manley high school, murder, noble network charter school, non CPS, Roseland, school violence, south side, street violence, tilden high school, youth voices

‘It shouldn’t be that easy’

May 25, 2010 - no comments

Department officials estimate that about two-thirds of the 1,200 inmates in the state's eight juvenile justice facilities have been diagnosed with a mental illness and that half the young men and nearly all the young women have thought about or attempted suicide before they enter the system.

While it may be impossible to eliminate all suicide risks behind bars, the state has failed to take simple steps to protect these teenagers from themselves.

Tags: 15-19, African American, criminal charges, drugs, family violence, fatherlessness, government involvement, gun violence, male, may 2010, mental illness, murder, non CPS, police involvement, poverty, prison industrial complex, suicide

Upending Twisted Norms

May 12, 2010 - no comments

One of the most frightening aspects of the murderous violence plaguing so many urban neighborhoods across the country is the widespread notion among young people that killing somebody who ticks you off is normal. It’s something that is only to be expected, like eating when you’re hungry.

Tags: 15-19, academia involvement, community involvement, CPS, gang violence, gun violence, hispaniclatino, interpersonal violence, male, murder, New York Times, non CPS, police involvement, street violence

Success ‘up to you,’ teens told

May 08, 2010 - no comments

When Dorian Boyland was growing up in South Shore, he joined a gang, the former Pittsburgh Pirates baseball player turned multimillionaire auto dealer confessed.

Seeing he was headed for trouble, his single mother sent him away to live with his grandmother.

Tags: 15-19, African American, church involvement, corporate involvement, CPS, drugs, gang violence, morgan park high school, murder, robeson high school, street violence, youth voices

Bloody Urban Landscapes

May 07, 2010 - 1 Comment

Driving through some of this city’s neighborhoods is like driving through an alternate, horrifying universe, a place where no one thinks it’s safe to be a child.

You follow a map in which the coordinates are laid out in blood. Over there, in front of that convenience store, is where Fred Couch, 16, was shot to death last December. The Couch boy went to the same school, Christian Fenger Academy, as Derrion Albert, an honor student who was beaten with wooden planks and kicked to death three months earlier in a broad daylight attack that was recorded on a cellphone by an onlooker.

Tags: 15-19, African American, church involvement, community involvement, CPS, drugs, family violence, fatherlessness, fenger high school, gang violence, gun violence, murder, New York Times, north west side, Prologue Early College High, south side

Chicago has come a long way

April 27, 2010 - no comments

Tio Hardiman knows Chicago's killing fields better than most people. The director of CeaseFire Illinois keeps tabs on violent conflicts across the city. He and 120 workers broker truces -- sometimes literally getting between gunmen -- to stop the shooting.
So Hardiman's opinion on whether Chicago should allow the Illinois National Guard to safeguard the city carries some weight.

Tags: april 2010, Chicago Sun Times, gang violence, government involvement, gun violence, interpersonal violence, male, murder, New York, police involvement, south side, west side

Kids killing kids

March 15, 2010 - no comments

Over the past 10 years, Bigeck and Morfin have traveled annually from a downstate prison to talk with Chicago-area school and youth groups. They explain,
mostly in calm terms, what it's like to spend their decades doing penance for gunplay. They try to press home to young audiences an underappreciated concept that Illinois law calls "Accountability for Conduct of Another." Its essence: You were.


Tags: 15-19, African American, chicago tribune, CPS, criminal charges, Englewood, englewood high school, female, gang violence, gun violence, male, march 2010, murder, police involvement, school violence, southwest side, street violence