HOUSTON—At Worthing High School in southeast Houston, the focus Friday was more on grief than learning. Counselors were brought in to help students cope with the loss of one of their own: 17-year-old star running back, Deandre Elliot.
“I don’t understand,” said the teenager’s father, Detrick Elliot. “Why him? You didn’t have to take his life, he would have given it to you.”
Deandre’s life was taken just before midnight at an apartment complex in southeast Houston. Police said he had just left his girlfriend’s apartment, when she heard gunshots outside, and then Deandre knocked on her door. Police say he was wounded in the head and chest. They say the teenager collapsed on the doorstep and was later pronounced dead at the scene.
A witness reports seeing a suspect in his early 20s leaving the scene in Deandre Elliot’s car, a 1992 Buick Park Avenue. It is blue-green in color and with custom wire spoke wheels, say police.
“I’m not angry. I’m hurt,” said Deandre’s grandmother, Betty Elliot. “I’m in a lot of pain. Sometimes you just can’t explain how you feel inside.”
The teenager’s grandmother and father remember him as a responsible young man who took academics as seriously as sports. They add he was always full of joy and compassion.
“Someone who really cared,” says Betty Elliot. “He cared about his friends. He cared about his family. He was very family oriented, and right now, there’s a hurt you can’t explain.”
The search is on for the suspect who is still at large.
