FORT MYERS, Fla. – De’mari Jackson’s loved ones are remembering him as a hero.
The 16-year-old Fort Myers High School student and football player died while shielding a friend from gunfire. A teenage girl told police officers Jackson pushed her and told her to run.
“He was just a ninth-grader. A neat kid. It’s a sad situation. Real tragic situation. He was a good kid. Laidback. Sadly in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Fort Myers High School Coach Sam Sirianni told the Fort Myers News-Press.
De’mari wasn’t the intended target, police said. He was wounded Sunday evening, just hours after his baptism, and died at the hospital.
Syncere Trice, 19, a South Fort Myers High School student and football player, was accused of firing the weapon. He is being held without bond in Lee County Jail.
“When I interviewed him and spoke with him, a good young gentleman. He’d come to me, ‘Hey sir, no sir, yes sir.’ Things of that nature. Really a well-respected kid so, just hearing this tragic situation is just awful, honestly,” Izubee Charles, a sportswriter, told WINK. “That’s the last thing I’d put next to his name honestly, seeing Syncere Trice and second-degree murder.”