A recent string of violent shootings in suburban Dolton has shaken the community, and on Thursday night dozens gathered to demand action from village officials and from the community as a whole.
At a candlelight vigil honoring the recent victims of violence in Dolton, family members of 16-year-old Akeira Boston joined other residents in prayer to honor the victims.
“We must do something different as a community, and if we don’t, shame on us!” Pastor William Fleshman said.
Boston was shot to death on Tuesday night outside of a convenience store off of Sibley. The high school cheerleader was sitting in a car waiting for a friend when she was shot by a bullet not intended for her.
“I’m sure quite somebody knows something. Please say something. A mother lost her child,” Pastor Glasper Thompson, Boston’s uncle, said.
The village is also mourning the loss of 40-year-old Marshia Bowman, who was killed while driving in a vehicle with her four children earlier this month.
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“She loved everybody and cared for everybody,” former coworker Jessica Foulkes said. “She didn’t want anything in return, but that’s how she was. She had a loving heart, and she was a blessing to others.”
In another shooting earlier this month at a Sibley car dealership, two armed men sent a police officer to the hospital as he was responding to a robbery in progress at the location.
All of these shootings have left residents shaken, and demanding answers, as the surge in violence continues.
No one is in custody in either the murder of Bowman or Boston, and police are continuing to investigate the crimes.
