CHICAGO _ Michael Brunson is used to showing up for families and friends of shooting victims.
Clad in the signature highlighter-yellow shirts donned by the Institute for Nonviolence Chicago, the outreach worker says he dedicates his life to interrupting the cycle of violence that afflicts parts of the West Side.
On Sunday evening, Brunson was one of the grieving.
The father of his grandchildren, whom Brunson said was like a son to him, was killed in a double shooting earlier that night in the Fifth City neighborhood.
Two men were standing outside in the 3200 block of West Congress Parkway about 9:30 p.m. when a group of males walked over and at least one of them opened fire, according to Chicago police.
A 33-year-old man was shot in the chest and taken to Mount Sinai Hospital, where he died. Another man, 41, suffered a gunshot wound in his leg and was in good condition at the same hospital, police said. No one was in custody.
The 33-year-old's name has not been released by authorities, but Brunson identified him as Adonta Scott, who lived in the neighborhood.
As a member of the institute, Brunson went to nine funerals in a two-week span this summer. But Scott's death inflicted a different type of sorrow.
"I work in the field," Brunson said. "It's like you know what's going on, but you don't expect it to hit this close. ... This is a whole new feeling because it's family."
Scott and Brunson's daughter had an 8-year-old daughter and a son who turned 16 last week. The two met when they were in their preteens and dated until recent years, Brunson said.
"He was a nice, fun-loving guy who loved his kids," Brunson said. "And the kids love him."
Although the couple ultimately split up, Brunson remained close with his grandchildren's father, with Scott frequently turning to him for advice. The 33-year-old's own father was deceased, so he looked up to Brunson as a parent figure.
"He always called me Pop, gave me the utmost respect," Brunson said. "He was a good, good guy."
Brunson said the block where Scott was killed was known to be a territory that the New Breeds gang was feuding over. He sometimes advised Scott to stay away from that area, but much of the 33-year-old's family lived nearby, Brunson said.
The crime scene on Congress stretched over entire block, from Kedzie Avenue to west of Spaulding Avenue A bright green playground sits in the middle. Two officers stood on the bridge over the Eisenhower Expressway, which ran below the site of the shooting. Another officer edged past the fence to the expressway embankment, shining a flashlight into the bushes before returning to the sidewalk on Kedzie.
A police helicopter whirled above them.
Brunson spent most of the evening outside Mount Sinai, waiting to speak with Scott's mother, who was inside the emergency room. As he stood by the entrance, Brunson pondered the solution to the constant retaliatory shootings on the West Side.
"There's so much going on with this generation," Brunson said. "What is it going to take? What do we have to do? What does the city have to do?"
