13-Year-Old Who Spoke Out Against Gun Violence Hit By Stray Bullet

By Mae Rice in News on Mar 28, 2016 3:12PM

Thirteen-year-old Zarriel Trotter, who appeared in an award-winning anti-violence video PSA, was hit by a stray bullet Friday night. He underwent surgery for his injury Saturday morning at Mt. Sinai Hospital, and was recovering—but sedated and still in critical condition—as of Saturday night.

"I don't want to live around in my community where I got to keep on hearing and hearing people keep on getting shot, people keep on getting killed," Trotter says in the PSA, which you can watch here:

The video was filmed at Trotter's Austin school, Circle Rock Charter School last year, according to the Sun-Times; it went on to win a Mosaic Media Image Award for Advocacy Media from the American Advertising Federation.

Trotter was shot at 8:30 p.m on Friday, in the 5500 block of West Jackson Boulevard in South Austin, police report. He was hit in the lower back, near his spine, and was not the intended target, according to police.

Officer Veejay Zala, a Chicago police spokesman, told the Tribune that the shooting began with an argument between two groups. A man from one of the groups pulled out a gun and fired shots.

“We’re all praying he stays strong,” his school’s principal, Elizabeth Jamison-Dunn, told the Sun-Times.

No arrests have been made in connection to the shooting, and police are still investigation, police said Monday.