Chicago boy, 13, featured in anti-violence campaign shot in back Local Chicago boy, 13, featured in anti-violence campaign shot in back CHICAGO (FOX 32 / AP) — A Chicago seventh-grader featured in an anti-violence campaign was shot in the back by a stray bullet outside his home. 
 
 CHICAGO (FOX 32 / AP) — A Chicago seventh-grader featured in an anti-violence campaign was shot in the back by a stray bullet outside his home. 
 
 Last Friday night, Zarriel Trotter was caught in the middle of what police call a "heated argument" down the street from his home. Trotter was walking along West Jackson Boulevard in the South Austin neighborhood when he was shot in the back. He was rushed to Mt. Sinai Hospital in critical condition where he underwent emergency surgery. 
 
 The 13-year-old remains in the hospital Monday night where FOX 32 is told his condition is improving. He was just 11 years old when the PSA was filmed and at that young age, he still had the fear of being shot. 
 
 Now, his fear has become a reality. But not just for him. 
 
 “I never think that he would get shot,” said Zarriel’s friend Jason Newman. 
 
 Trotter is an athlete and often shoots hoops with his friends at Columbus Park, which is just one block away from where he was shot. 
 
 Newman lives across the street from Trotter in the South Austin neighborhood and says they know they are taking a chance every time they step outside. 
 
 “When it’s night time people be shooting out here and I think if I come outside, they start shooting,” Newman said. 
 
 Two years ago, trotter spoke out against the violence in Chicago in a public service announcement. 
 
 “Can you please just stop killing people,” Trotter said in the PSA. 
 
 The creators of the PSA say they wanted to give a voice to those most affected by violence in the street - our youth. 
 
 “The most disheartening thing was if I grow up, most of these kids don't have an expectation of growing up,” said Fay Ferguson of Burrell Communications Group. 
 
 
 
 At the time, the 11-year-old had some words of wisdom for the gunmen, which is advice that wasn't taken Friday night. 
 
 “Keep their hands to themselves and handle what you got to handle with your words instead of your fists or whatever you are going to hurt this person with,” Trotter said in the PSA. 
 
 Also, in his PSA interview, Trotter said he wants to grow up and either be a clothing designer or artist to make money for himself and for others less fortunate. 
 
 No arrests have been made, and police are still investigating the crime. 
 
 The Chicago Sun-Times reports that 70 other people have been shot in the city's Austin neighborhood this year. ||||| Zarriel Trotter, a 13-year-old who hails from the city's West Side, was part of an award-winning anti-violence campaign just a year ago. 
 
 However, on Friday night, the teen was hit by a stray bullet several blocks from his home, becoming one of more than a dozen people injured in shootings across the city. He underwent surgery early Saturday and by the afternoon remained in critical condition at Mount Sinai Hospital. 
 
 "I don't want to live around in my community where I got to keep on hearing and hearing people keep on getting shot, people keep on getting killed," the seventh-grader, known by friends and family as Zari, said in the public service announcement titled "Black is Human." 
 
 The minutelong announcement, a YouTube video, begins with a statement shown on the screen: "The leading cause of death for black boys and teens: Homicide." The statement appears to cite 2013 data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 
 
 It goes on to show short clips of several other African-American boys about Zari's age describing their feelings — ranging from anger and fright to sadness and hope for a better world — about shootings and homicides of black boys and young men. 
 
 The video ends with the written statement: "The loss of a black boy is a loss for America." 
 
 Elizabeth Jamison-Dunn, principal of Catalyst Circle Rock Charter School where the teen goes to school, says he was one of several third- through eighth-grade boys who were interviewed last year as part of the anti-violence campaign. 
 
 Earlier this month in Washington, D.C., the American Advertising Federation gave the video an Advocacy Media Award, according to Jamison-Dunn and the Facebook page of Burrell Communications, which created the ad. 
 
 On Saturday, Jamison-Dunn said: "I'm praying for him, praying for his speedy recovery." 
 
 Zari's condition has not gotten any worse, but he is sedated and hasn't been able to speak yet, Jamison-Dunn told the Tribune Saturday afternoon, adding that the boy's mother was at his bedside. 
 
 The teen was shot in the lower back, close to his spine, about 8:30 p.m. Friday in the 5500 block of West Jackson Boulevard in the South Austin neighborhood, according to family and Chicago police. The shooting scene is about a half-mile from both his school and his home. He was not the intended target, police say. 
 
 Two groups of people got into a heated argument on the street when a male assailant from one of the groups pulled out a gun and fired shots, said Officer Veejay Zala, a Chicago police spokesman. 
 
 About 6 a.m. Saturday, Jamison-Dunn received an email from Chicago Public Schools confirming the victim was a student at the charter school, located at 5608 W. Washington Blvd. CPS governs charter schools. 
 
 John J. Kim / Chicago Tribune Crime scene tape lies in the grass March 26, 2016, in the 5500 block of West Jackson Boulevard in Chicago's South Austin neighborhood, near where 13-year-old Zarriel Trotter, inset, was shot the night before. Crime scene tape lies in the grass March 26, 2016, in the 5500 block of West Jackson Boulevard in Chicago's South Austin neighborhood, near where 13-year-old Zarriel Trotter, inset, was shot the night before. (John J. Kim / Chicago Tribune) (John J. Kim / Chicago Tribune) 
 
 "It was disheartening," she said about the shooting, adding that Zari's attack was the second time in about a week that gun violence has struck near the school. About a week ago, four men were shot about a block from the school. None of them were students at the school. 
 
 Zari, who is a "great big brother and great young man," brings positive energy and he tries to do well in school, she said. He loves basketball and shoots baskets during free time and lunch hour. 
 
 The teen and his younger brother, a third-grader, always walk to school together. 
 
 "Every morning he greets me with a big smile on his face, which makes my day," Jamison-Dunn said. "I feel horrible that this happened to him." 
 
 Zari has attended the school for several years and for the last two has been involved in the school's male empowerment mentoring program, which includes regular meetings with influential men in the community, Jamison-Dunn said. 
 
 "He is a valued member of our school community," Jamison-Dunn said. "We love him. He's our child. We want him to get better." 
 
 Malkey Cobb, the boy's great-uncle, said the teen was walking home after playing basketball with his friends when he was shot. 
 
 "He is a good kid," Cobb said by phone Saturday morning. "It's horrible that kids get shot up like this." 
 
 Zari has lots of companions, one of his friends told the Tribune on Saturday. 
 
 "He is cool, he gets along with everyone," the 14-year-old girl said, adding that Zari, who is adventurous and friendly, likes to be outside playing basketball with many of the boys at school and is a good student. 
 
 The girl, who lives in Austin, has known the 13-year-old for about two years. 
 
 The shootings in the neighborhood trouble her and she said she feels bad that she counts her friends as victims. 
 
 "It gets scarier out here every day. Young people in Chicago can't go outside without knowing whether they will be the next person fired at," she said. 
 
 achachkevitch@tribpub.com 
 
 meltagouri@tribpub.com 
 
 rsobol@tribpub.com ||||| Photo 
 
 A 13-year-old Chicago boy who appeared in an award-winning public service video about the effect of gun violence on the city’s black youth was shot in the back and critically wounded, officials said Monday. 
 
 The boy, Zarriel Trotter, was struck by a stray bullet after two groups of youths began a “heated argument” Friday night on the city’s West Side and one person pulled out a handgun and started firing, Officer Jose Estrada said. 
 
 “He was not the intended target,” Officer Estrada said. “He was standing on the sidewalk.” 
 
 No one else was injured, and there have been no arrests so far, he added. 
 
 Zarriel, known to his friends and family as Zari, was one of several students who took part in a series of social media videos last year intended to highlight the toll that gun violence was taking on the black population. 
 
 The youths were picked from the third to eighth grades at Catalyst Circle Rock Charter School on the West Side, said Lewis Williams, the chief creative officer of Burrell Communications Group, which produced the videos. 
 
 In the videos, which were part of a YouTube and Facebook campaign called “Black Is Human,” teenagers spoke one by one about their fears of someday being counted in the unrelenting scroll of gunfire statistics, and of their sadness abut the violence in their neighborhoods. 
 
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 “I don’t want to live around my community where I got to keep on hearing and hearing people keep on getting shot, people keep on getting killed,” Zarriel says about halfway through the video. 
 
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 A grim statistic appears at the start of the one-minute video in which he appears: “The leading cause of death for black boys and teens: homicide.” 
 
 The video ends with the statement, “The loss of a black boy is a loss for America.” 
 
 Elizabeth Jamison-Dunn, the principal of Catalyst Circle Rock Charter School, where Zarriel is in the seventh grade, said in an interview with The Chicago Tribune over the weekend that the boy was recovering in the hospital and had not been able to speak yet. 
 
 “It was disheartening,” she said about the shooting, adding that it was the second time in about a week that gun violence had erupted near the school. “Every morning he greets me with a big smile on his face, which makes my day,” Ms. Jamison-Dunn said. 
 
 There have been 46 shootings from Jan. 1 through March 26 in the district where Zarriel was wounded, compared with 19 in the same period last year and 18 in the same period in 2014, Officer Estrada said. 
 
 “There has been a substantial increase,” he said in a telephone interview, adding that the reason for the increase was not immediately clear. “Unfortunately, when you see crime, there are so many factors. It would be impossible to narrow it down.” 
 
 Burrell Communications Group, which develops productions that focus on social problems affecting the black population, was recognized with an Advocacy Media award from the American Advertising Federation this month for “Black Is Human.” 
 
 “Our hearts go out to Zarriel and his family,” the company said on its Facebook page. “We wish him a speedy recovery.”
– "I don't want to live around my community where I got to keep on hearing and hearing people keep on getting shot, people keep on getting killed," Zarriel Trotter said in a PSA filmed at Chicago's Catalyst Circle Rock Charter School last year. He is currently recovering in a hospital after being hit by a stray bullet in Chicago's Austin neighborhood on Friday. The boy's great-uncle says the 13-year-old was walking home from playing basketball with friends when he came upon two groups of youths arguing around 8:30pm, per Fox 32 and the Chicago Tribune. A male then opened fire and Zarriel was hit in the lower back, police say. He was listed in critical condition on Saturday after an emergency surgery, though authorities say he is slowly improving. "He was not the intended target," an officer tells the New York Times. "He was standing on the sidewalk." "We're all praying he stays strong," adds Zarriel's school principal, who notes the seventh-grader—with a "positive energy that's contagious"—has yet to speak. "I never think that he would get shot," says a friend of Zarriel, but "when it's night time people be shooting out here and I think if I come outside, they start shooting," he says. The Chicago Sun-Times reports Zarriel is the 71st person shot in Austin this year. In his PSA interview, he had this advice for those living a life of violence: "Can you please just stop killing people?" he says. "Handle what you got to handle with your words instead of your fists."