Visually impaired Chicago mother mourns her teenage son who was shot and killed after helping her get around



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Brittany Benson, a Chicago mother of three who has trouble seeing, will no longer be able to depend on her 15-year-old son to help him get around after he was killed in a shooting on Wednesday, according to a Chicago Sun. Time report.

“I told her, ‘You are my eyes,'” she told the local newspaper. “It was one of my biggest fears… I told her, I love you and I don’t want this to happen to you. One of the worst calls a mother can get is that her son is dead.”

Benson’s story is one of the many tragic episodes that unfold in Chicago on a daily basis.

There have been 1,827 shootings in Chicago so far this year, a 10% increase from the same period in 2020.

On Wednesday alone, Benson was one of 18 people shot dead in the city, pointing to an increase in violence against children as 97 children aged 15 and under were shot in 2021, according to an analysis by the Chicago Sun- Times.

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“Street justice is endless. The appetite for revenge is never satisfied,” Chicago Police Superintendent David Brown said at a press conference to address the violence on Wednesday. “It only hurts, it only ruins your community. And we need the community to step forward now. We are in a battle for the hearts and souls of some of our communities, and now is the time. to speak.”

At least 11 people were killed and 45 others were injured in shootings in Chicago last weekend.

Attorney General Merrick Garland traveled to Chicago on Thursday to meet with Brown, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot and other city officials about the rise in crime.

“Here today, the threat of violent crime – especially gun crime – is a tragedy that only continues to continue,” Garland said Thursday. “I feel it especially in my hometown here.”

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The Justice Department also this week announced new strike forces to crack down on gun trafficking in Chicago, New York, Washington, Los Angeles and San Francisco.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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