CHICAGO (CBS)– An event meant to honor Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. ended with gun violence.
A young man, 23-year-old Emoni Atomah, was fatally shot outside St. Sabina Church in the same spot a Peace March happened just hours earlier in Chicago’s Auburn-Gresham neighborhood.
Dr. Martin Luther King’s birthday marred by gun violence.
A 23-year-old was shot & killed outside the same church where a march for peace had happened just hours earlier.
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Police said the 23-year-old man was shot in the chest just outside the church a little after 11:30 p.m. Wednesday. The shooting happened just a few hours after an event on Dr. King’s birthday called the Blue Light March for Peace.
Hundreds were led by Father Michael Pfleger Wednesday night as they remembered all of the people killed by gun violence in 2019.
Hours later, paramedics put a shooting victim into an ambulance.
Shell casings were scattered on the ground right outside St. Sabina.
Father Pfleger said the victim approached a member of his church pleading for help moments after he was shot.
Atomah was taken to University of Chicago Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead.
“This violence, it’s just become the norm, it’s just crazy,” Pfleger said. “It’s Dr. King’s birthday, we just had a peace march here and there’s somebody shot in the same night. It makes angry and it breaks my heart. I’m tired of it. I’m just tired of it.”
Police said no one is in custody.
