Brittany Benson, 32, sits in her mother’s living room Thursday in Lawndale and looks at a childhood photo of her 15-year-old son Damarion Benson, who was shot to death less than 24 hours earlier at the corner of Douglas Boulevard and Christiana A

‘I told him, You are my eyes.’ 15-year-old killed in Lawndale mass shooting had looked after visually impaired mother

“I called Damarion and told him he needed to come home,” the boy’s mother said. Minutes later, a gunman opened fire, killing Damarion Benson and wounding four others in one of three mass attacks in a single day in Chicago

By Edward Era Barbacena

A Chicago mother says she had called her son to ask him to come home on Wednesday evening. Just minutes later, he was shot and killed in the city’s North Lawndale neighborhood, leaving his mother to grapple with his shocking death and to ask the question of why.

Brittany Benson has trouble seeing and depended on her 15-year-old son Damarion for simple tasks.

Damarion Benson, 15, last spoke to his mother just before 6 p.m. Wednesday night. She asked him to come home.

Wednesday evening she called Damarion and told him he needed to come home. “He said, ‘I know, I know. I love you, mom.’ ”

“He was like ‘okay mom. I love you mom.’ That was the last conversation I had with my child,” she said.

Series of mass shootings in the city on Wednesday. He was struck in the head when he was shot near the intersection of Douglas and Christiana just after 6 p.m., and he was later pronounced dead.

Now, his mother is left with one question on her mind: why her son?

Damarion Benson (file photo)

“Why? Just why?” she asked. “Y’all trying to be God. Y’all not God. Why y’all take my baby’s life? He was only 15. He wasn’t perfect, but why?”

Brittany Benson says she was born with congenital glaucoma, so Damarion wasn’t just her eldest child.

“He was my eyes,” she said. “If I needed him to sweep or mop or anything, he would do it. I have some sight, but not 20/20 vision, and I’m not able to drive or travel alone.”

“This was one of my biggest fears,” said Benson, 32. “I told him, I love you and I don’t want this to happen to you. One of the worst calls a mom can get is that their son is dead.

Brittany says that her son loved to play basketball, listen to music, and to talk to girls. Now, he is one of a growing number of people who have been gunned down in the city this summer, in a surge in violence that city officials are scrambling to bring under control.

He dreamed of playing basketball professionally and expressed an interest in rapping, his mother said.

She encouraged her son by promising a gift if he graduated from high school. “I told him, you bring on that high school diploma and I’ll get you a car.”

“Damarion was one hell of a kid,” she added. “He was doing typical things teens do. He wasn’t perfect — but he loved his family.”

He attended Lawndale Community Academy before a juvenile conviction sent him to jail, Benson said. He graduated from Nancy B. Jefferson Alternative School and was supposed to start at Wells Community Academy this fall.

Damarion was due in court Thursday morning, one of the reasons his mother had called him.

“You know how it is. It’s peer pressure,” she said. “When you’re a kid you get caught up hanging out in the wrong crowd... He was in the juvenile system — but he was a kid.”

Damarion had two younger brothers, 4 and 7, who he watched over and sometimes took to the bus for school when his mom’s eyes were causing her trouble.

“There’s so many babies getting killed in Chicago,” she said. “The mayor and superintendent should have been on top of this.”

While officials are vowing action against gun traffickers, and in combating gun violence with investments in communities, Brittany says that it is too late for her son, but that they are still seeking justice for his killer.

“I want him to go to jail for the rest of his life,” she said. “Why can’t they bring back the death penalty? I want them to feel everything my son felt.”

Damarion is among 97 kids 15 years old and younger who have been shot in Chicago this year, an increase from the same time last year, according to Sun-Times crime data. Twelve of the children died.

Minutes after Damarion was shot, another mass shooting happened three blocks away. Three teenagers and two men were shot outside Herzl Elementary near Douglas Boulevard and Ridgeway Avenue, according to police, who said they believed the shooting was unrelated.

Hours later, gunmen from three cars opened fire on a group that had been riding in a party bus. The bus had just pulled up to a gas station in the 1600 block of North LaSalle Drive.

Police Supt. David Brown, pressed about the attacks, complained many community members were not cooperating with investigators.

“It’s not an exaggeration to say we are in a battle for the heart and soul of some of these communities as it relates to violence,” Brown told reporters at a news conference.

Brittany Benson was still grieving the loss of a brother when she heard about her son.

“I just want him to be remembered for his sense of humor,” she said. “He was a genuine person. He’d do anything for you.”