The teenager shot to death at a DeKalb County apartment complex Thursday afternoon was an innocent victim and in the wrong place at the wrong time, his family said.
“He didn’t deserve to die,” Lawanda Boyer, the teen’s aunt, told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution late Thursday. “He didn’t deserve this at all.”
Dominique Boyer, 18, was a senior at Columbia High School, and as the oldest of four, was looking forward to graduation in May, Lawanda Boyer said. Friday morning, his classmates and teachers had a moment of silence to remember the teenager killed by gunfire.
After school Thursday, Dominique went to the Austin Oaks Apartments on Glenwood Road to visit a friend, Boyer said. Dominique and other teens were hanging out in the stairwell of a complex around 4:45 p.m. when shots were fired, according to DeKalb County police. The teen had spoken on the phone with his mother just 10 minutes before, Boyer said.
Investigators were interviewing witnesses Thursday night, but had not made any arrests, Lt. Mark Lavigne said.
Boyer said Dominique was not the intended victim.
“My nephew was just an innocent bystander,” Boyer said. “He got shot in the head and in the chest.”
Dominique was transported to Grady Memorial Hospital, where he died, his family said.
A respectful and happy teenager, Dominique was a popular student who planned to go to college and become an accountant, Boyer said. Now, his family is pleading for the person responsible to come forward to police.
“I don’t know the person, but my heart is telling me someone knows,” Boyer said. “Someone knows something. There’s a killer still out there.”
—Staff writer Bryan Cronan contributed to this report.
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