Juan Otero, 15, from East Harlem, NY was shot to death last night around 9:30 while heading to the store, just steps away from his home. Juan was taken to Metropolitan Hospital where he was pronounced dead.
Juan had spoken to his mother, Jessica Montilla about 15 minutes before the incident. She told Eyewitness News:
“He’s not the first and he won’t be the last to die this summer, believe me, the streets is hot, there’s going to be a lot more deaths and a lot of mothers feeling the way I feel; I wish them all the best, no one deserves this.”
Fifteen candles now mark the spot where Ortero fell.
As Reported By ABC.com
She arrived home shortly after and poured her heart out to Eyewitness News.”I come home in a cab, running because the street is closed off,” Jessica Montilla said. “The cab couldn’t come down. I knew something happened. It’s a mother’s gut feeling, when they’re on your street, you just think the worst. And I was praying, please, please let it be okay. Let him be upstairs. He was my baby.”
A neighbor said he heard multiple shots. Ortero was on his way to the corner deli when he was approached by the gunman. He was shot and left on the sidewalk to die.
“That’s his blood,” Montilla said, pointing to the ground next to the memorial.
It was the second time Ortero was shot in his short life.
He had one arrest last November for robbery, but his mother said she was trying to set him straight. She said the moved out of a troubled apartment complex so her son could be safer.
No arrests were made and police did not immediately have a motive.
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15-Year-Old Juan Otero, Shot To Death.
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Candles mark a makeshift memorial, next to bloodstains.
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A friend of the victim lights a candle.
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Jessica Montilla mourns her son with family.
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Ortero’s family mourns at the spot where he was shot.
