Teen beaten to death caught on tape!!
1:10 September 28, 2009
News & Politics
5iv3z
CHICAGO, Illinois (CNN) -- Three teenagers have been charged with first-degree murder in the death of a 16-year-old boy whose beating was captured on amateur video.
Derrion Albert was beaten to death last week. His death was captured on video.
Nineteen-year-old Silvanus Shannon, 16-year-old Eric Carson and 18-year-old Eugene Riley were charged as adults with first degree felony murder, said Tandra Simonton, spokesperson for the Cook County States Attorney.
They are charged in the death of Derrion Albert, an honors student who was beaten to death last Thursday. An amateur videotape of the beating has been broadcast nationally.
It's unclear who shot the footage, but a local television station that received the tape turned it over to police.
The tape shows attackers wielding two-by-fours and punching and kicking a single person. At one point, four or five males are seen beating and stomping the same young man after he falls to the ground.
As the attackers run away, the person with the camera and several others approached Albert and carried him into a nearby building. "Derrion, get up!" a female voice pleads.
On Monday, family and friends, some wearing shirts bearing Albert's photo, held a vigil in his honor.
They asked the community to turn in anyone they knew who was a part of Albert's beating.
"What kind of person, what kind of individual, has such rage and such anger and such madness?" the Rev. Michael Pfleger said. "We've got to get to the hearts of our children, because nothing, nothing, excuses or justifies the actions of an individual who would beat another individual. Nothing justifies that in this society. "
Pfleger said it was time to make a change, so children aren't afraid to go to or from school.
He said this kind of teen violence was not just an issue for Chicago, but from "Oakland to Newark."
Ron Huberman, CEO of Chicago Public Schools, said he had met with Albert's classmates.
"How do we make sure this event doesn't become another event?" he said. "Another vigil on another day."
Huberman said he will fight every day to ensure the safety of children in Chicago's schools.
"We can promise them and we can say that we we will absolutely remember Derrion," he said.
Flanked by people holding signs with photos of a young child and the words "Don't shoot, I want to grow up," Pfleger pleaded for peace.
"It's time for guns, and it's time for two-by-fours to stop being the way we treat each other," he said.