After I was shot, my friends wanted retribution, but I chose empathy
By Marlon English
I always knew I would get shot. It wasn’t a question of if but when.
I was born and raised on the South Side — in West Chatham and Woodlawn. I became involved with a street tribe at a young age. The block we lived on and who my friends and family were determined my affiliation. I witnessed the kind of things you might see in a movie: drug trafficking, gambling, shootouts, fights. I was deeply entrenched in the heart of conflict, destruction and mayhem.
Because of that, I’ve suffered a lot of loss and grief — and gained a well-rounded understanding of why people shoot.
Things started to change for me in 2009. After one of my neighborhood friends was killed, my mom decided to relocate my sister and me to Rogers Park. Being in a different neighborhood on the opposite side of Chicago exposed me to better opportunities and possibilities. I started working summer jobs and became involved with community organizing.
But I always seemed to find my way back to the ’hood. I started to feel like I was living two separate lives. I’d spend my time in Rogers Park working or doing community work, only to head back to the block in Woodlawn. Life was pulling me between gang-banging and community activism.
Then, on Aug. 15, 2015, my two worlds collided. It seemed like an ordinary day, but, for some reason, I felt very paranoid. I received a call from one of the homies asking me to keep a peace circle with some members of our street tribe. There was a lot of infighting. He knew I was leading peace circles to squash conflicts on the North Side and asked me to help.
On my way to 61st and Kimbark, I took the scenic route to avoid running into the opposing side. When I arrived, we were all hanging on the street, like we normally did. I observed a car passing by with two guys who appeared to be staring at us. Soon after, the same car drove past again. That’s when I heard the loud explosions and saw sparks flying.
My ears rang as I tried to move out of the way of the gunfire that rained upon us. I felt a sharp burning sensation in my right hand and wrist. When I stopped to check on myself, I noticed a hole in my shirt near my lower abdomen. I immediately sat down. My friends rushed to me in a panic and called an ambulance. I remember being in pain and feeling anxious that I wouldn’t get to the hospital in time because the South Side didn’t have a trauma center.
Family, friends and my activist community all came to visit me in the hospital. While I felt like my life had always been characterized by chaos, their presence made me realize I was also surrounded by a lot of love. Getting shot made me witness how valuable I am to a lot of people.
I spent the next six months recovering at my uncle’s house. The bullet that entered my stomach damaged my kidneys, colon and intestines. I could no longer use the restroom on my own, which meant I had to wear a colostomy bag. That was extremely humbling. I didn’t want to eat much or really be around people.
While I was embarrassed by my physical condition, my recovery also gave me the chance to sit and reflect on my life for the first time. I realized that I could’ve been dead. I became grateful to be alive and have the opportunity to improve not only my life but also the lives of the people around me.
Strangely enough, getting shot put me in a position to be stronger and wiser. I began to think about people in my community who were constantly in a state of mourning — for the loss of loved ones or for themselves. And I didn’t want that for myself.
That moment of reflection also helped me see that gun violence is a much more complex issue than how it’s usually portrayed. People not having what they need, not being able to access different pathways to healing or an overall purpose in life often leads them to situations where they feel like they need to pick up a gun. I believe that people don’t want to kill other people but do so mostly out of fear. I understood why the person who shot me was hunting me and my friends — it came with the world we were a part of. Getting shot made sense to me. But it made more sense to me to walk away from all of that.
So I left the streets and threw myself into my community work even more. I wanted to do my part in helping to stop the cycles of violence I was once a part of.
I now run a group called Stick Talk that works with youth incarcerated with the Illinois Department of Juvenile Justice. Working with them showed me that we need to approach gun violence more empathetically. Listening to their stories, I realize how many of the young people in Chicago are products of their environment. Some of the young men I work with had their first gun placed in their hands by their own parents.
When I was shot, my friends and family were angry and wanted retribution. I instead chose to focus on the fact that I still had my life and could help stop the violence in my community.
It took a lot of life experience to understand that punishment and revenge aren’t the solution. I didn’t want the guys who shot me to go to prison because I know prisons are just a cage meant to punish people, not rehabilitate them.
I often ask people to think about: What if someone you loved made a mistake? Would you want society to handle them with care and grace or with punishment and violence? Would you want them to have the chance at rehabilitation or be thrown away forever?
True love nearly got me killed
By Eroica Del Real
Every June, the streets of Humboldt Park are filled with people coming to celebrate the Puerto Rican parade. Flags fly, horns beep, and people brim with pride. Carnival rides, food vendors and neon lights are visible throughout the neighborhood.
But many who visit Humboldt Park once a year don’t see the decades of gang warfare that plague these streets.
I’m telling the story of that hidden warfare and how I got swept up in it because I want to show that there is life after losses, and there is life after incarceration.
However, in order for people to truly heal, we need more help. There needs to be more investment in victim services in communities where gun violence is common.
At a very young age, I became affiliated with a local street organization. On June 22, 2002, I was leaving the carnival with my boyfriend Ivan. He insisted on walking down Division Street even though a rival organization was known to hang out there. I decided not to go, and we parted ways, taking two different routes toward the same destination.
As I walked about a block, gunshots rang out, and I felt a chill. Subconsciously, I knew what had happened. I ran in his direction, crying, praying and hoping that I was wrong. But I wasn’t. I watched as my high school sweetheart lay on the pavement. We were only 18. I watched as police put up the caution tape. In a few minutes, my life flipped upside-down — my heart torn out and broken. I was angry that this happened, sad and left with regret for not walking with him.
My life quickly spiraled. I couldn’t face the fact that Ivan was gone, so I started drinking heavily and smoking PCP to avoid feeling anything. These addictions caused me to turn to a criminal lifestyle. Hurt people want to hurt people. In 2005, I was charged with my first gun case. My innocence died alongside him that night as darkness, sorrow and depression filled me.
Four years later, before I could heal, my second boyfriend, PJ, was shot and killed. I had just been with him earlier. In the middle of the night, the police knocked on my door, and I was forced to go with them to the station. I didn’t know why. They told me he had been murdered while I slept.
I sat in the 25th District police station, crying all alone, when a woman police officer embraced me. I left the station and went to where he was murdered and threw myself on the floor. This couldn’t be life. The thoughts that would go through my head were unbearable.
I tattooed my left wrist, right where some people slice and commit suicide, with what I felt: “True love almost killed me.”
People in the neighborhood began to call me the Black Widow, so I tattooed a spider image on my right wrist.
There was not enough time to think. My survival mindset made me feel like I needed to just keep going. That crying was weakness. Losing these two people — in addition to so many friends — to gun violence affected my outlook on the crisis in Chicago. I felt like it was normal to lose people you love that way.
After years of studying community violence, I now know this is the result of structural violence in urban communities. Neighborhoods like the one I’m from are starved of necessary resources.
After these traumatic events, I yearned for peace. I began to attend church and re-enrolled in college. But in 2008, my past criminal lifestyle caught up with me, and I was picked up by the FBI. I was the only woman out of 47 people indicted in a gang conspiracy case. I was sentenced to five years and sent to the only U.S. penitentiary for women, in Hazelton, West Virginia. While sitting in a 6-by-9 prison cell, I had to finally face reality and sit in my grief. Alone and sober, I realized that I needed help. I had been holding myself together for so long. In my community, the topic of mental health is stigmatized, and there is a lack of resources for victims’ loved ones.
In prison, I discovered a passion for helping others even while battling my own struggles. Since many of the women were immigrants, I noticed a language barrier. I volunteered to teach Spanish 101 and English as a second language. I also taught women empowerment and self-esteem classes so that they could build themselves up and heal. I connected with these women, as we were all broken in one way or another from past trauma. I began to turn my hurt into motivation. I started taking correspondence courses and became a certified drug and alcohol treatment specialist. I also completed a 4,000-hour teacher’s aide apprenticeship.
After five years, I was finally allowed to rejoin society in 2014. Upon my release I worked in insurance for six years before becoming a trauma response specialist at the county hospital, Stroger. It’s the place where I was born and where Ivan was taken when he died. There, I helped victims of gun violence and their families access victim services.
My greatest joy is being able to help someone else. My pain was not in vain — because of it, I found my true purpose in life.
I recently earned my bachelor’s degree in community health with a minor in re-entry and violence prevention and am now working with various groups that help formerly incarcerated people re-acclimate to life outside. I’ve gotten to teach about trauma healing and violence prevention inside the Stateville state penitentiary.
Sometimes, people with the darkest past end up creating the brightest future.
I hope that my story shows that there is life after loss, and there is life after incarceration. It is true that hurt people hurt people — but it is also true that healed people can help heal other people.
Living in Woodlawn, I’ve seen the economic toll of violence
By Aja Johnson
On March 20, I got a call telling me that my dear friend Kim “Casper” Williamson was shot and killed. I met Casper in the early ‘90s after my family moved to Woodlawn from Hyde Park. At first, I couldn’t process his death. I’d like to think it was my body protecting me.
As I sat at Casper’s funeral, listening to his daughter speak, I realized he had successfully positioned his family to not need anything financially.
That aspect of Casper’s death reminded me of a death in my own family and the financial and emotional toll it took. I thought I’d let down my neighbors in Woodlawn by not helping them plan for a better financial future — especially because I travel the country speaking at seminars about financial literacy and closing the wealth gap. What more, I thought, could I have done for the neighborhood I left?
I grew up in Hyde Park at a time you could send your child outside to play and know they would come back home safely. The beach along Lake Shore Drive was my backyard. My friends and I regularly went to the Museum of Science and Industry and the Harper Theater. We dined at Thai Siam, Giordano’s and El Lugar. Having multiple parks to choose from was a luxury. We would build clubhouses in the alleys because they were clean. The neighborhood was vibrant, multicultural and rich with history, architecture and design. Our neighbors were artists, historians, bankers, activists, doctors, students and even included Harold Washington, the former mayor. Hyde Park had many two-parent homes where the fathers worked and the mothers stayed home. My neighbors were usually in a rush. I thought it was because they had somewhere to be in life.
In 1992, after eight years in Hyde Park, my mother and stepfather Stanley “China Man” Muldrow moved our family southwest to Woodlawn to save money on rent. Living in Woodlawn was a complete culture shock. I was so upset that I wouldn’t play outside for an entire year. Many homes were in bad condition, people seemed to roam aimlessly, and gunshots could be heard at all times. I didn’t understand why I had to live there.
I didn’t see the beauty of Woodlawn and everything it had to offer. It felt like a place that seemed almost impossible to survive. I vowed to move away the second I could.
Not long after we moved there, Stanley was shot and killed. Just like Casper, my stepfather was shot after intervening in a dispute. Stanley tried to break up a fight between his niece and her abusive boyfriend on a basketball court behind Dunbar High School.
My mother and stepfather got married after only three dates — less than a year before his murder. Their relationship provided financial and emotional balance to my mother’s life. He was smitten with her and loved getting up to work at a regular job, then bringing home his check.
Because they had moved so fast in their union, we didn’t have much time to develop a personal connection. I was OK with that because he was proving to be upstanding and gentle regardless of his gang ties.
My stepfather’s death didn’t leave us poor. Unlike many peers who lost loved ones in Woodlawn, my family was fortunate enough to have a small insurance policy that helped cover his burial. And because he was murdered on the streets of Chicago, I received a monthly $300 benefit from the state until I went to college. That helped me continue school and stay focused.
I never saw my mother cry or react to my stepfather’s death. I guess her defense mechanism to dealing with the trauma was to work. She was now responsible for taking care of me by herself. This is when I feel like my mother lost balance. She always made sure I had the best of things, lots of money in my pockets, but she couldn’t be there because she was always trying to keep herself busy to not deal with the loss of her husband.
By the time I was ready to experience Woodlawn firsthand, there were only a few people in the neighborhood I looked forward to seeing, and Casper was one of them. He lived on the next block. He was definitely living in the fast lane as part of a street organization, but he was different in that he always showed respect to everyone no matter their age. He was creative and wise. I felt safe when he was around.
There weren’t enough Caspers in my life to make me want to stay in Woodlawn. After a few years, I could see how the environment and a lack of parental guidance were having a negative impact on everyone. Many of the boys from the neighborhood were getting killed.
In 1996, I left. For many years, I would never speak to anyone from Woodlawn except for Casper. My trauma made me shun the area.
But, with some time and distance, I realized that people living in Woodlawn have valuable skills to offer. The neighborhood had tons of children bursting with creativity and people surviving with just a little bit. It took Casper’s death for me to understand the many facets of the neighborhood and the special people who call it home.
Woodlawn is lacking resources by design. People who live there need to be given opportunities like jobs and education to reach their full potential. Change can’t come from those who aren’t invested enough to live there. That is the highest level of commitment and sacrifice.
After sitting with the guilt I started to feel at Casper’s funeral, I came to realize that gun violence perpetuates cycles of poverty. Not only does it leave family members in financial need for funeral costs and often missing an income, but it also has a bigger ripple effect.
The crisis is killing people who have the potential to stabilize their neighborhoods — people who could be leaders and help stem the violence — while simultaneously scaring off residents who could help improve it economically and culturally.
People like me.
Like a distant cousin, I had become once removed from Woodlawn and twice removed from being a part of change for a community that’s hit hard by gun violence. The trauma of losing friends and family while living in Woodlawn fueled my desire to leave.
Now, I realize I had it all wrong.
I survived a mass shooting, but then the healthcare system failed me
By Carla Johnson
It was a beautifully warm summer evening in June 2021. I was eight months pregnant and still queasy most days, but I decided to get some tacos from a restaurant in West Englewood that I visited often.
I took a shower, threw on my favorite black sundress and matching Ivy Park slides and headed into the perfect Chicago summer night.
After getting my food, I headed over to say hello to my best friend Angela just a couple of blocks away. When I arrived, I saw another friend, Yogi, who was excited about my pregnancy. We joked, chatted about what she was going to cook for my baby shower and updated each other on the latest viral Reels.
I waved goodbye, Styrofoam taco container in hand, and heard gunshots.
As I lay on the ground in a pool of blood, all the worst thoughts played in my head: stories of people who died before reaching a trauma center, my unborn child not surviving, the devastation this would bring my family.
More than two years later, I’m still healing from my injuries. I’ll never be the same. My journey to recovery, which started with so many mishaps in the hospital, has been long and excruciating. It has shown me the heavy burden society places on survivors of gun violence to heal themselves.
In a city with thousands of gun violence victims and over 7,000 hospital beds, I felt failed by the healthcare system. It’s hard to believe that the standard of care is so low for survivors.
I’ve always found confidence in my strength. My physical well-being was always a priority. I worked out regularly, ran track and was an avid soccer player for years. When you’re young, you can’t control many things, but my physical ability was something I felt like I had power over. It sustained me in my work as a longtime community organizer and chef. It helped me start my own catering company that helped to feed community members in low-income neighborhoods.
But the mass shooting that injured me and 10 others and took Yogi’s life shook that foundation. I’m sharing the details so people can witness what happened to me and understand what happens to other victims of gun violence every day.
As the bullets rang out, I remember telling myself to get down. I remember people running in every direction — some of their dashes curtailed by the force of the firearms. I remember watching bodies fall while I was still getting shot. I remember searching to feel the ground through the blood beneath me. I remember how a police officer stepped over me with no acknowledgement as I begged for a tourniquet. I remember the male EMT who inspected my stomach and left my sundress rolled above my pelvis before walking away to attend to others.
I spent about a week and a half in the hospital. My experience there was another trauma. My pain was excruciating, and, due to my pregnancy, there was not much medicinal relief offered. My left foot, left calf, right leg, thigh and arm all had been hit. The damage to my right leg was the most severe — it broke my tibia completely, causing severe nerve damage that still limits my walking and balance. I had to beg hospital staff for simple things like a wheelchair, commode, gauze and a shower chair. I was discouraged from having those necessities billed to my insurance and told to buy them myself. While still in a traumatized state, I was given little instruction, expected to know how to care for an injury I never had before.
All I could think about was: How would I deliver a baby in my condition, how would I get home and inside my apartment, how would I use the bathroom, what would motherhood look like now?
With the help of family and advocates, I was able to get home with a few supplies to carry me over for a week. And, just like that, I was expected to start healing.
The truth is that this is when the lasting trauma began. I visualized the terror from that night constantly, believing the shooters who haven’t been caught would return at any moment to finish me off. The bulk of my days was spent attempting to guide my thoughts away from the shooting so that I could pretend I was OK.
The unknown was the scariest part: How would I take care of this baby? Would I ever walk? Who even am I now? My ambitions, my drive, my dreams ran out of me as quickly as the blood in my body.
It wasn’t until I turned to a community of survivors that I was able to set myself on a path toward recovery. These were friends and family who had been shot themselves — people I love and respect who are able to successfully navigate their day-to-day lives despite their disabilities. From them, I learned where to get free gauze and which types would work best for my wounds. A friend instructed me on the necessity of leg warmers and heating pads during the Chicago winter because the cold heightens the pain of the bullet fragments that are still in my body, making it feel like I’m being sliced from the inside. Another friend walked me through, on FaceTime, the best way of getting up and down my stairs.
Connecting with a community of other survivors made me feel less alone. It has helped me process my emotions.
And it lit a spark in me. I joined community organizations and projects that focus on educating and empowering our neighborhoods. I threw a Black joy event with a focus on training people in the community to respond to shootings. We gave medical kits to businesses in the area where I was shot in case community members needed to provide first aid to gunshot victims as they waited for help. I hosted a winter wonderland toy drive just a few yards from where I was shot.
Some people questioned why I would go back, but this is my community. Where else would I go?
I gave birth to a beautiful baby girl in September 2021. She was healthy and perfect, and she gave me a daily dose of strength and motivation that I needed. I always loved being a mom, watching my kids grow and being able to guide them on their journeys. My life was always so fast-paced, but now I’m taking in motherhood moment by moment. I’ve made sure to celebrate each of our milestones together.
Taking time for myself was necessary but new to me. I’m still physically struggling with everyday tasks and trying to get back to a routine. My life still feels like a roller-coaster.
But this community has helped me realize that I was always strong — not because of my physical abilities but because of the inner strength I possess.
Sometimes, you just need people who’ve had similar experiences to guide you.
My 16-year-old son was shot to death, now I ask you to please put the guns down
By Jaree Noel
I arrived at my daughter Janyah’s high school graduation on a warm day in May. When I stepped into the building, staff began shutting all the doors to the auditorium where the ceremony was taking place because people were sneaking in without tickets.
I started to worry. As I fought back tears, I thought, “Jaree, you need to get in there to see your baby girl get her diploma because you won’t be able to see your son walk across the stage next year.”
My son Rishawn Hendricks was shot and killed in North Lawndale on Oct. 22, 2022. He was 16 years old. And, like many other Black Chicagoans, I still don’t know who did it.
Rishawn was scheduled to graduate from high school in 2024, which made seeing my daughter walk across the stage feel so important. I keep these milestones close to my heart.
Rishawn was a good kid who didn’t bother anybody. I now know this can happen to anyone and that I may never get the justice my son deserves.
I never imagined my life would turn out this way. As a child, I had many dreams. I wanted to graduate from high school, go to college and pursue a degree in criminal justice.
All of that changed in 2004, when I became pregnant at age 16. Seven days after Janyah was born, I thought my life was over. I had a seizure, a stroke and an aneurysm. I was placed in a coma. Those first few months after leaving the hospital were hell. I had to battle depression while being on several medications and learning how to be a mom. I knew I had to get better for my daughter.
A year later, I noticed something felt off and discovered that I was pregnant. Because of my medical history, this was a high-risk pregnancy, and I couldn’t afford two kids at a time. My boyfriend at the time and I considered not moving forward with the pregnancy, but I decided to keep my child. My boyfriend named our son, but he died in a car accident in April 2006. On Aug. 21, 2006, Rishawn was born. I immediately knew that I had made the right decision.
Years passed, and we got our own place in North Lawndale. My kids never gave me any problems. Shawn was amazing, respectful, joyful, helpful and strong. When he was about 9, he had his tonsils taken out. Shawn insisted that he was OK and demanded to go to school. He loved being around his friends. I eventually let him go. I just knew Shawn was going to be a strong kid like me.
When Rishawn made it to high school, he was on the basketball and football teams. All he wanted to do was enjoy his friends, play sports, play on his PS5 and listen to his music, especially Mariah Carey’s “All I Want For Christmas Is You” and Fantasia’s “When I See You.”
The last day I saw my son was Oct. 22, 2022. Earlier that day, I was joking and laughing with him. I wanted to barbecue because the weather was so pleasant. He asked if he could go outside. I said it was OK. I watched him leave through the rear gate and head toward a playground about a block away.
When I stepped inside the house to check on the macaroni I was making, my partner started yelling.
“You heard that?”
“What happened?” I asked.
”They were shooting,” he said.
“Where were they shooting?”
He pointed toward the playground.
“Call Shawn now,” I remember saying.
My partner called Shawn about three times. I called his phone, but there was no response. From my backyard, I could hear children calling Shawn’s name. I thought: “OK, there are several children named Shawn.” But, at the same time, I was terrified it was my Shawn.
I was nervous as I walked to the playground. As I got close, two kids came running, crying, telling me Rishawn had been shot. I asked if he was OK, but they said they had no idea.
Before I got close, I saw him lying on the ground while the paramedics tried to revive him. I noticed my baby was not moving. I knew he was gone.
I had to go to the hospital, where I saw he still wasn’t moving. The physicians said what no parent wants to hear: “I’m sorry. We did the best we could. He came in without a pulse.” That moment permanently damaged my life.
Now, when I see young men walking, laughing and playing around my neighborhood, all I want to do is cry because I know my son is meant to be here.
I often ask myself: What was the point? Rishawn was a good kid who didn’t deserve this. It’s been over a year since Rishawn was killed, and we still don’t know who shot him. It’s painful to think that we might never know.
Please put the guns down. Too many people are gone for no reason.
Every day, I hear about another child losing their life. Many are killed like Rishawn — by being in the wrong place at the wrong time. We parents will never be the same, especially those of us who don’t get justice.
And, every day, I wish we could get justice. Justice for losing a child, a friend, a family member. Justice for living in a city where there’s no real control over guns.
I constantly ask myself what would that even look like for people like me? How would it feel?
Part of me wants the person who did this to be found by the police. But I also know that isn’t going to bring Shawn back. Even if we find out, I’m still going to hurt because I’m never getting my son, my heart, back.
I was eventually able to get in to my daughter’s graduation. One of my son’s coaches heard that I was stuck outside. He and Rishawn were close, and he knew how important this moment was to me.
I was excited to see my daughter walk across the stage, to see all her hard work pay off. But I could sense the pain my daughter felt because my son wasn’t there to watch her.
I’m now organizing Rishawn’s graduation. We plan to have our own ceremony with close family and friends. I wish I could have had more time with my baby boy, but I know he is with me every day. I can’t be selfish because I still have to make sure I’m OK for myself and my daughter.
Son, I know you’re on this long journey, and I can’t join you right now, but we will meet again.
