UPDATE: Family of 17-year-old victim speaks out
A shooting Saturday night outside of America’s Best Value Inn took the life of a local Fruitland teen. According to reports, 17-year-old Rakim Russell, or Roc as he was affectionately known, was shot after he left a party at in the inn. Police say Russell was pronounced dead at Peninsula Regional Medical Center early Sunday morning. His mother, Shanell Johnson, spoke with 47 ABC Sunday.
“My kids are my life, so part of my life is gone,” Johnson said outside her house. Johnson said she learned her son had been shot when her daughter frantically called her shortly after midnight.
According to a witness, that asked not to be named, the party at the inn ended early right before midnight because a fight had broken out inside. After the venue had been cleared out, party goers still remained in the parking lot. It was there that another fight broke out. The witness said that a group of males that had been in the fight left in a four-door white car. According to him, the car came back moments later, stopped in the adjacent Mattress Warehouse parking lot and fired four to five shots into a crowd of people.
“After they stopped there they just started shooting at everybody, everybody in the crowd right there; then that’s when everybody just scattered out and that’s when we (saw)the little dude that’s laying there dead,” the witness said.
Salisbury Police have not yet commented on the eye-witness account.
Johnson said her son was loving and a peacemaker, who did not have any enemies. She said she received numerous calls early Sunday morning saying that Russell was not the target of the shooting.
“He was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. You know like the first call I got was the bullet wasn’t meant for Roc, the bullet wasn’t meant for Roc. Roc got killed for no reason,” Johnson said. “A bullet doesn’t have any name on it. So, when they play with these guns, anybody can lose their life.”
Johnson said her son had dreams of being a rapper and frequently told her he would take care of her once he got famous. Before pursuing his rap career though, Russell had made a promise to his mother to graduate high school, which he was set to do this year.
Johnson said her son was her voice of reason and although he’s gone now, that’s how she will continue to remember him.
“I’ll never forget that voice in my ear after I lay him down to rest. I can hear him say ‘it’ll be alright mom, I’m gone but it’ll be alright mom’,” Johnson said.
Currently police officials tell 47 ABC that they have very few details at the moment and no suspect descriptions.
Police and the family are urging anyone who knows anything about the shooting to come forward. The number to reach Salisbury Police is (410)-548-1776. Authorities say the investigation is still ongoing.
