On July 29, 14-year-old basketball star Semaj Miller was gunned down in South Los Angeles.
At six-foot-seven-inches tall, the Compton teenager was expected to go far with the L.A. City Wildcats, an association that helped launch the career of NBA player James Harden.
Now the community is mourning his loss.
"Semaj was such a talented kid who lost his life too soon," Rapper Percy “Master P” Miller, a coach and part-owner of the team, told Cheddar. "We have to stop this senseless killing, gun violence in our community. It's not the police. This is us killing us."
Miller lamented that gun violence is robbing the next generation of its talent, as well as those who could find success and come back and invest in their communities.
"This kid could have been the next LeBron James, could have been the next James Harden," he said. "We'll never get to know how talented this kid could have been."
Stepping outside of the rhetoric used in recent protests against police violence, the rapper said it was the responsibility of citizens to stop the violence in their own communities.
"I know we're out here protesting for Black Lives Matter, but my thing is, 'Okay, our kids matter,'" he said. "This is our future."
Miller didn't outline specific preventive measures but emphasized parenting and education.
"It's got to start in our community. We have to stand up for these kids. We have to protect them. We have to educate them," he said.
Kelly has been convicted in a sex trafficking trial after several accusers testified in lurid detail how he subjected them to perverse and sadistic whims when they were underage.
“Dear Evan Hansen” may have been a hit on Broadway, but the filmed adaptation of the Tony-winning show is off to a slow start at the box office in its first weekend in theaters.
Instagram is putting a hold on the development of Instagram kids, geared towards children under 13, so it can address concerns about the vulnerability of younger users.
All the news you Need2Know for Monday, September 27, 2021.
All the news you Need2Know for Friday, September 24, 2021.
Neopets are making a new kind of comeback, this time in the form of non-fungible tokens (NFTs).
Cheddar recs "Bob's Burgers," "The Great North," "Doom Patrol," "Cry Macho," and "Designated Survivor."
Jill and Carlo break down the latest on the booster debate, what's happening at the southern Texas border, Biden's attempts to break a Dem logjam over his economic agenda, and high schoolers get a lesson in labor shortages.
Facebook's semi-independent oversight board says it will review the company's "XCheck," or cross check system following an investigation by The Wall Street Journal into the use of an internal system that has exempted high-profile users from some or all of its rules.
Jill and Carlo debrief Biden's big UN speech, the troubling rise of antisemitism on campus, the sad confirmation that Gabby Petito was murdered and Google doubles down on a return to office.
