Chicago community leaders and gun violence survivors stood in solidarity with pastor, Rev. Michael Pfleger, Monday evening as he call for action in response to a violent Father’s Day weekend that resulted in 104 shot across the city, 14 fatally. NBC 5’s Natalie Martinez reports.
Chicago community leaders and gun violence survivors stood in solidarity with pastor, Rev. Michael Pfleger, Monday evening as he call for action in response to a violent Father's Day weekend that resulted in 104 shot across the city, 14 fatally.
Rev. Pfleger and community members are asking the city of Chicago and state of Illinois to be as aggressive as they were with the coronavirus pandemic in the fight against gun violence.
"People invested all types of money into that," said Kim Bodley, a gun violence survivor whose 18-year-old son was fatally shot in 2006. "The state and city. They have it. They just chose not to invest it in the Black lives that’s being taken. We need that to change."
Four children, including a 3-year-old boy and 13-year-old girl, were among those shot and killed during the weekend.
"We needs state's attorney, sheriff, governor, mayor. Get tougher in room and figure this out," said Pfelger, the pastor of Chicago's Saint Sabina Church. "Figure this out! That's what we pay you to do."
Just hours after a three-year-old was shot Monday, the second in three days, the group demanded that the police department work to solve crimes and asked the community to help break the "code of silence."
"There should [be] outrage," said Pfleger. "The same as when a police officer kills. When Black lives are taken by, whoever they're taken by, there should be outage in the city..."
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Approximately 10 minutes away, along the Dan Ryan Expressway, street pastors prayed for help to break free of what some are calling the "new normal."
""If you pray, then pray," said a street pastor. "If you march, then march. But do something."
