Chicago police announce 2 charged in March fatal shooting of girl, 12, celebrating birthday
CHICAGO (WLS) -- Chicago police announced charges against two men in the fatal shooting of a 12-year-old girl who died while celebrating her birthday in March.
Nyzireya Moore, 12, was in a car with family members in the 2300-block of West 72nd Street shortly before 8 p.m. on March 2 when police said someone began firing shots down the street.
Police said the girl was shot in the back of the head and family drove her to Comer Children's Hospital, where she later died.
Chicago girl, 12, dies days after being shot in West Englewood while celebrating birthday
On Tuesday morning, Chicago Police Superintendent David Brown announced that 22-year-old Malik Parish and 20-year-old Abdul Ali have been charged with first degree murder. Superintendent Brown also said Parish has also been charged with possession of a stolen motor vehicle and Ali was charged with unlawful use of a weapon.
Brown said Parish is a convicted felon who has been arrested 11 times and Ali has been arrested four previous times.
Brown said a third suspect remains at large.
"These are violent people and their criminal history has shown them to be violent. We need to throw the book at these people," Brown said.
Chicago Police Chief of Detectives Brendan Deenihan said an anonymous witness came forward, which led to the arrests.
Police said in a videotaped confession, one of the suspects admitted that they and at least one other person were shooting at what they thought was a vehicle belonging to a rival gang member when a stray bullet struck the girl in the back of her head.
Despite the release of surveillance video showing the attack and the promise of a $15,000 reward for information leading to an arrest, it took nearly eight months for the anonymous tip to break the case.
"None of that in the beginning generated any leads, so the really pivotal point is we received some anonymous, an anonymous witness from the community," Deenihan said.
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