Teen accused of killing retired police officer turns himself in at mother's request

WEST GARFIELD PARK — The teenager accused of killing a retired Chicago police officer is being held until trial after his mother and a community activist persuaded him to turn himself in to authorities, officials and officials said Tuesday. the community activist.

The 16-year-old boy is charged as an adult with one count of first-degree murder in the fatal shooting of Larry L. Neuman, a 73-year-old former bomb technician who was killed last week on the lawn of his West Garfield Park home, police and prosecutors said.

The teen, who Block Club is not naming because he is a minor, appeared in court Tuesday and was held in custody pending trial.

“There could have been more victims in this case,” Judge Antara Nath Rivera said during the hearing. “The defendant’s actions, in committing a brazen crime in this neighborhood, put the entire community at risk. The victim was in front of his house, a place where one should feel safe.

The shooting occurred around 11:30 a.m. Thursday, when two armed people wearing ski masks and dark clothing approached Neuman as he was “taking care of the exterior of his home” in the 4300 block of West Monroe Street and paid a laborer who mowed his house. lawn, Assistant State's Attorney Anne McCord said in court.

An accomplice of the teen, still at large, yelled “freeze” and tried to grab Neuman, McCord said. Neuman reached for a gun in his waistband and the construction worker saw the 16-year-old point the gun at Neuman and shoot, McCord said.

Neuman pushed the worker aside during the incident, police previously said. The worker ran and jumped a fence while the two people wearing ski masks ran into an alley, McCord said.

Neuman's wife heard the loud noises and came outside to find him lying on the ground, McCord said. Neuman, a pioneering member of the department's bomb squad, died of gunshot wounds to the chest and leg, police said.

Prosecutors have not shared a potential motive for the attack.

“A 73-year-old retiree was mowing his lawn in the neighborhood where he lived, with the help of someone, when individuals armed with guns and wearing masks arrived ready to shoot and kill,” McCord said. “And that’s exactly what happened.”

Police released photos this weekend of two people identified as suspects in the murder. Neighbors and witnesses in West Garfield Park helped identify the teen to police, prosecutors said.

A witness riding a bicycle past the house just before the shooting greeted Neuman before leaving and then saw two people coming out of the alley behind Neuman's house, McCord said. That witness said he recognized the teen from the neighborhood and picked him out of a lineup, McCord said.

Four people “very close to this defendant from the neighborhood or his school” identified him in surveillance photos taken around the scene of the shooting, McCord said.

The teen went to police Sunday after learning his photo had been shared on the news and after his mother contacted community activist Andrew Holmes to help him go to police, Holmes said Tuesday. The teen also learned that neighbors had given his name to detectives, his public defender said.

Holmes drove the teen to the local police station at his mother's request, he said.

“She didn't want this headache for the whole family, the police coming, doors being kicked in, search warrants. She wanted to do the right thing, bring her child to the police station,” Holmes said. “We met, we talked, she convinced him that this is what he wanted to do…come in and give your side of the story, and go from there.”

The teen was placed on electronic monitoring for a July 2023 case in which he is accused of fleeing police in a “high-speed chase exceeding 120 miles per hour” on the Eisenhower Expressway before crashing the stolen car, McCord said. Police found a loaded Glock with an extended magazine and a “switch” that turned the gun fully automatically inside the stolen car, McCord said.

He frequently violated his electronic monitoring and was placed on home confinement in February, McCord said. The teen and an accomplice are also suspects in a March armed robbery of a Volkswagen in which a 10-year-old child was inside, McCord said.

“He shouldn't have even left his house, let alone into an alley, let alone with a gun, let alone committing murder,” McCord said.

The teen's defense attorney, Molly Schranz, said the shooting was not clearly filmed and those who identified him may have been motivated by a high reward offered for an arrest and conviction.

The teen has not been convicted of any crime, Schranz said.

“He wasn’t trying to run from the charges,” Schranz said.

Holmes sat in court Tuesday next to members of the teen's family, his eyes closed as the prosecutor read the charges. He added that he hoped the teenager's accomplice would “follow suit” and become a police officer too.

“He took the life of a patriarch, he was someone who could have helped him. But his life was cut short,” Holmes said. “This is what's happening across the city and across the states: teenagers are unloading these guns and grabbing these guns.”

Neuman started with the police department in 1982 and retired in 2010, working in arson and explosives investigations, police said. He was one of the first black bomb technicians in the Ald. Police Department. Jason Ervin (28th) has already declared.

Neuman was also a former Marine, pastor and longtime member of St. Michael Missionary Baptist Church, 4106 W. Monroe St., Police Supt. » said Larry Snelling. After retiring from the police department, Neuman joined the TSA as a bomb assessment expert at O'Hare and Midway airports, according to an agency spokesperson.

On Sunday, Snelling and Ervin, also a former cop whose district includes the area where the shooting occurred, led a procession of officers, neighbors and supporters in Neuman's honor.

As a pastor, Neuman was “outspoken about the violence in our neighborhoods,” Snelling said.

“Larry Neuman did what he always did: he acted heroically, he risked his life to try to save someone else's,” Snelling said. “He probably didn't know how to do it any other way, because that's who he was as a human being. »

During the procession, Ervin thanked “the community [Neuman] loved and the community that loved him” for sending tips to investigators. The West Side alderman said he has received calls from former West Garfield Park neighbors living as far away as California offering information about the case.

“While we cannot bring Rev. Neuman back, we can begin the process of holding accountable those who helped take his life,” Ervin said.

The teen's next court date is July 16.

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