Skip to footer

Congressman Danny Davis's grandson fatally shot over basketball shoes

Rep. Davis of Illinois was elected to his 11th term earlier this month. His 15-year-old grandson was home with family members when a dispute with another 15-year-old turned fatal.

|
M. Spencer Green/AP/File
Rep. Danny Davis, seen here in 2009, lost his 15-year-old grandson in a fatal shooting in Chicago, the Democratic congressman and police said.
  • By Associated Press Staff

| CHICAGO

A dispute over shoes led to the fatal shooting of the grandson of US Rep. Danny Davis (D) of Illinois, said Chicago police Saturday.

Two teens went to the home of 15-year-old Jovan Wilson in the Englewood neighborhood of Chicago on Friday night, where one shot him after an argument, police said.

"This stems from a dispute over shoes, basketball shoes," said police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi. "Young people are using guns to settle petty disputes over clothes," Guglielmi said.

Mr. Guglielmi said Jovan knew his attackers and they may have been friends at some point.

Chicago has seen a dramatic rise in the number of shootings and homicides, with August being the deadliest month in the city in two decades. There have been 673 homicides so far this year, including the fatal shootings of the cousin of Chicago Bull Dwyane Wade, a Chicago police officer's son and the son of a famed percussionist.

Jovan's mother was not at home, but his uncle and three siblings were, said Representative Davis in an emotional statement.

"I grieve for my family. I grieve for the young man who pulled the trigger," Davis said. "I grieve for his family, his parents, his friends."

Police have not arrested anyone or named any suspects, but Guglielmi said investigators have good leads.

Davis, who was re-elected this month to his 11th term in the 7th Congressional District and is a former Chicago alderman, was in Chicago on Friday and spoke with reporters after talking to police. He wondered how the shooter obtained the gun and said he'd continue to try to combat gun violence.

Davis described his grandson to the newspaper as a "typical 15-year-old" who liked music and basketball, someone who "knew all about ... the stats of different players."

With Jovan's father at his side, Davis said, "I have dealt with this for many years. I've spoken at many funerals of young people – 14-, 15-, 16-, 17-, 18-year-olds," he said. "I guess I always knew that the possibility existed that it could happen close to me."

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to Congressman Danny Davis's grandson fatally shot over basketball shoes
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/2016/1119/Congressman-Danny-Davis-s-grandson-fatally-shot-over-basketball-shoes
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe