AKRON, Ohio — After a 7 and 19-year-old were shot on Sunday after a youth football game in Akron, 3News sat down with the city’s youth and community opportunity director to learn more about the issue of youth violence in the city, and the resources available to combat it.
Akron police say the suspected shooter could be 11 to 15-years-old.
Denico Buckley-Knight was at Lane Field on Sunday with his son, who plays youth football. He said he left the field minutes before the shots were fired.
“It’s one of those areas that we would think would be safe for youth and young adults to be able to [have] fellowship and have extracurricular activities,” he said. “Very unfortunate that we are, in our community, dealing with shootings that are occurring at football fields.”
In his role as youth and community opportunity director, Buckley-Knight is tasked with creating opportunities for Akron’s youth in order to build a better community, hopefully reducing violence.
Buckley-Knight is also a football coach in Akron, and said his team lost one of their young players last week to gun violence. He’s seen firsthand, twice in the past week, how gun violence impacts communities.
“It’s definitely a traumatic event when our youth are constantly dealing with shootings that are occurring in our community,” he said. “Particularly when you lose a friend, or you lose a neighbor, it’s definitely something that hits different.”
Reflecting on Sunday’s events, which led to a 7-year-old hospitalized in critical condition and undergoing surgery, Buckley-Knight called the situation “tragic,” especially when considering there’s a young person, possibly 15 years old or younger, who isn’t afraid to use a gun in the community.
“But I also think that young adults don’t just wake up and become shooters and killers,” he said. “So I think that as a community it’s really an opportunity for us to really start identifying what are we not doing to support these young adults.”
According to data from Summit County Public Health found on the city of Akron’s website, in 2020-2021, the second leading cause of death in both 15-24 year olds and 25-34 year olds was assault. Assault was the third leading cause of death in 5-14 year olds, following unintentional injury first, then cancer.
Data from the Pew Research Center states that that there were 1,732 gun deaths in kids under the age of 18 in the United States in 2019. However, by 2021, there were 2,590 gun deaths in kids and teens. (The Pew Research Center notes this includes all categories of gun deaths, including homicides, accidents, and suicides.)
“I think currently here in Akron and nationally, a lot of youth and young adults due to COVID and the pandemic are coping with a lot of mental health issues, and often when you’re dealing with mental health issues, and you’re coping with drugs and alcohol, that can turn into gun violence,” he said.
To keep young people out of trouble, Buckley-Knight said the city has invested in a number of resources designed to engage Akron’s youth.
“We do ask our youth to be involved in extracurricular activities so they can stay out of trouble,” he said. “And when we’re doing that, and we have organizations that have the ability to keep them engaged and out of the streets, we need to create opportunities to support those organizations so they can enhance what they’re doing.”
Buckley-Knight says the city has a strategic plan around violence intervention and prevention, implemented in May, which focuses on mentorship, community-police relations, and workforce development, among other approaches.
Additionally, he also referenced the “out of school time” network. The city is one of the partners in the network, in addition to different foundations, community leaders, and the school district, among others.
Buckley-Knight said the network has three main pillars – sports and wellness, college and career readiness, and academics and enrichment. For example, he said dozens or nonprofits meet on a regular basis to discuss what resources are needed in the community through the academics and enrichment focus, while for the sports and wellness initiative, leaders in youth sports meet with the city to share issues, challenges, and successes they’re seeing, while encouraging kids to participate in sports.
He said the goal of getting youth engaged in sports and active in the community was in full swing on Sunday, when he said hundreds of kids and community members were present at Lane Field to play in and cheer on games.
"The event was very very successful - we ask our youth to be engaged in extracurricular activities, so there were over 250 youth and young adults that were engaged in extracurricular activities, and we, the community, were supporting and cheering the team on," he said. "Unfortunately, the gun violence that occurred created a tragic event."
For more information on how the City of Akron plans to reduce youth violence, click here.
