A 21-year-old man made the ultimate sacrifice on Chicago’s South Side on Saturday (June 20), as he died after being struck by a hail of bullets to protect his mother.
On the 8400 block of South Colfax, a man appeared from a gangway and shot at James Jones and his mother, Alicia Jones, 46, as reported by the Chicago Sun-Times. He then covered her body with his and was fatally shot in the process. The mother was wounded, but survived after undergoing surgery at the Advocate Christian Medical Center.
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“My sister just so happened to be coming out the front door,” Jones’s aunt, Dietra Luckett, said. “He took his body and put it on top of her body. He covered her body.”
Jones was out on parole after being sentenced for attempted burglary and had returned from buying a loose cigarette that night. According to Luckett, he was shot at by an unknown man in a parked van. Police are investigating whether the attack was gang-related, the Chicago Tribune reports.
Luckett says the family has not revealed his death to the mother, who is still recovering in the hospital and knows Jones saved her life. This is her third child to die as a result of the ongoing violence in Chicago since 1994.
At the scene of the crime, a note was left that only read, “I love you.”