Tyrone Foy stood on the corner of 81st Street and Normal Avenue early Thursday in a white T-shirt and mesh shorts.
Foy’s brother stood next to him and asked if he was cold.
“I ain’t cold,” the 20-year-old said as he looked past yellow tape at police officers investigating the death of a man who collapsed in front of him at his Gresham home.
Foy was in his room when he heard about eight gunshots around 12:30 a.m. Thursday. When he reached his front door, he heard another five ring out, Foy said.
He opened the door and saw a man crawling near 81st and Normal. Foy ran up and asked if he was all right.
“He pulled himself up and he tried to talk,” Foy said.
Foy called for an ambulance but said it didn’t make it in time. “He was trying to talk but the words weren’t coming,” Foy said. “He was trying to catch his breath. And he just … faded out.”
The man, later identified as 43-year-old Juan Warrior, was shot in the chest near Westscott Elementary School in the 8000 block of South Normal Avenue. He was pronounced dead at the scene, according to the Cook County medical examiner’s office.
Foy said he lost a friend to gun violence this year: 19-year-old Anfernee Durant, killed in January about two blocks from Thursday morning’s shooting.
He said he has known other people who have been killed, but Thursday was the first time he had seen someone die.
“I tried to help him to the best of my ability,” Foy said. “Couldn’t do nothing about it. It’s crazy. Couldn’t do nothing.”
For hours, police blocked off about half of the block on Normal between 81st and 80th streets. Warrior’s body was covered by a white sheet on the sidewalk that ran along Westcott school, a couple of blocks from Simeon Career Academy.
On the north end of the scene, members of Warrior’s family gathered near his car parked at the curb. Relatives said Warrior did not live in the neighborhood but was visiting a friend Wednesday night. Officials at the medical examiner’s office said Warrior lived in the 6500 block of South Wolcott Avenue.
More Top Picks How To Talk To Your Child About Their Diagnosis
A detective gently told the family members they would not be able to see the body but instead would need to formally identify him later at the medical examiner’s office.
On the south end of the crime scene, Foy stood with his brother and his aunt, Dawn Ducree, and watched as officers searched for evidence.
“I was scared to go outside,” said Ducree, 41, adding that she was about to go to bed when she heard gunshots. “But it’s my neighborhood. I need to know what’s going on.”
Ducree, who has lived on the same block for about six years, said she hears gunshots regularly in the neighborhood. She said she tries to teach her four daughters to stay off nearby streets.
If the girls want to go out, she said, she’d rather they go downtown, not in the neighborhood.
“I tell them: ‘You can get out of here,’ ” Ducree said. “We live in a beautiful city, believe it or not. … (But) there is nothing here.”
Warrior was among 14 people wounded by gunfire since Wednesday morning. Two of those shootings were fatal.