Teen’s death, his third encounter with gun violence in three years, shows persistent risks to survivors
CHICAGO -- Fifteen-year-old Swaysee Rankin was loved.
The friends and relatives who gathered last week to honor his life and death wanted to make sure everyone knew it, so they brought balloons, permanent markers and gluesticks to his vigil. They took turns writing messages on balloons and sticking photos of their friend to poster boards tacked to a wall.
They offered each other half-hugs and took pictures with their handiwork. Other teenagers arranged candles on the sidewalk.
It had been three days since a driver had dropped off Swaysee at South Shore Hospital with multiple gunshot wounds. He died less than two hours later. The driver remains unidentified.
Swaysee’s Sept. 4 death was his third documented encounter with gun violence: It had been two years since someone in a moving car and a cousin as they walked toward his home, leaving the boy in critical condition. It had been three years since he used his shirt to who he witnessed being
