His nickname was Cornbread. And when he wasn’t waiting on the corner for his mother on Monday night as she expecting him to, she knew something was wrong.
That’s when Timika Rutledge saw police cars rushing past, and minutes later she learned that her son, 15-year-old Cornelius German, was dead.
Cornelius was found lying in a nearby backyard, one shot to his back, and only four blocks from President Barack Obama’s Chicago home.
“I saw a police officer,” said Rutledge, 42. “He said a little kid got shot. Somehow I knew it was my baby. I went back there. I saw my baby on the ground in the grass. I saw his gym shoes and his jacket,” she said.
The teen had been with friends that Monday night, and he called his parents to pick him up in the nearby area. But when Ronald German and Rutledge didn’t see him, they tried calling.
That’s when the police cars arrived, and a bystander told Rutledge that “Cornbread” had been shot.
Friends told Rutledge her son was leaving a dice game in the yard when he was shot and that he wasn’t the intended target, an account police could not immediately confirm. Now, police are saying Cornelius was gang-affiliated, although his parents deny that claim.
She did, however, acknowledge that his older, rougher friends might have been involved in gangs.
No arrests have been made as of today.
