A heartbroken father spoke out for the first time Thursday, days after his teenage son was shot and killed at a house party in Oakley. This also comes just a day after police announced an arrest in connection with the deadly shooting.
“He’s my firstborn,” said Keith Tucker, the father of Kemarion Tucker. “We did everything together.”
The 16-year-old Junior at Liberty High School was an avid football and basketball player. He and some friends were at an Oakley house party Saturday night when someone opened fire, killing Kemarion Tucker and wounding three other teenagers.
“He didn’t want to be in the street life. He didn’t want to be influenced by peer pressure. He just wanted to be a kid,” said Tucker.
Tucker said he moved his family from Antioch to Brentwood a year ago to give his kids the best environment possible.
“The reason why we’re out here is so we don’t have to deal with things like this,” said Tucker. “Take him out of the areas where I feel that harm could be in his way.”
Deeja Williams, a neighbor, can’t stop thinking about Saturday night.
“It was chaos,” she said. “It was crazy. It was pure madness.”
Williams and her husband live across the street from the party, and ran out to help the kids that night. Her husband put a tourniquet on one of the wounded boys while instructing Kemarion Tucker’s friends not to move him.
“Just seeing their friend, just knowing he was gone and just screaming his name and crying. I’ve never seen anything like that in my life. It’s probably the saddest thing I’ll ever see,” she said.
Kemarion Tucker’s dad said he was a great kid and that his siblings looked up to him. He also dreamed of pursuing baseball and a career in the medical field.
“He just wanted to make his family proud,” said Tucker. “He always told me, ‘Dad, I just don’t want to be a failure.’ “
Oakley police announced Wednesday that they had arrested 18-year-old Antioch resident Jason Walizada on suspicion of the shooting. While Kemarion Tucker’s family say they’re glad that police arrested the suspect, nothing will bring him back.
Source: NBC Bay Area
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