- Oct 9, 1999
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This happened 3 blocks from where I live. He's been to my house and I played Rayman with him. It's really sad. Only 10 and might be paralyzed for life now.
Here's the story.
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Here's the story.
As 10-year-old Christopher Rodriguez sat down at a piano for his lesson at a North Oakland music school, he had no reason to foresee the horror that would soon befall him and leave him partially paralyzed, most likely for the rest of his life.
Christopher was on a piano bench at the Harmony Road Music School along bustling Piedmont Avenue about 4:30 p.m. Thursday when Jared Adams, 24 - who once complained in a court case that young urban dwellers such as himself got few opportunities in life - was robbing the Chevron gas station across the street, according to police.
Adams, who has previous felony convictions and a history of fleeing from police and carrying concealed weapons, fired three shots at an employee calling 911 before fleeing with his girlfriend in a stolen Ford Mustang, authorities said.
The shots missed the worker, but one of them tore through the music school's wall and ripped through Christopher's spleen, kidney and spine - missing his aorta by millimeters - before lodging in his side, where the round still remained Friday night, said Dr. James Betts, chief of surgery at Children's Hospital Oakland.
Two other bullets struck his mother's sport utility vehicle parked outside, narrowly missing Jennifer Rodriguez as she was talking to her husband on the phone.
Christopher, a fifth-grader at Crocker Highlands Elementary School in Oakland, is likely to be permanently paralyzed below the waist, Betts said.
At a news conference at the hospital Friday night, Richard Rodriguez said, "This is probably the worst thing that's ever happened to me in my life. I love my son greatly. I feel like half his life was taken from him, his inability, probably, to walk - ever."
He said his son, who is on the school's basketball team and just took up skateboarding, is "not fully aware that he might never use his legs again. This is just going to be a shock to him, I think."
Jennifer Rodriguez expressed gratitude for the public's support and lamented how "the energy of our planet is revved up to this degree where the combination of availability of firearms and lack of understanding of the consequences of using them is what we're seeing, and we're seeing more and more of it."
George Dewey, 41, of Oakland, was at the school taking his first piano lesson when he heard the gunfire.
Christopher "was saying that he was in pain, he was saying he wasn't able to feel his legs at that time, so I started to ask him to grip my hand to see if he had good pressure in his hands," Dewey said. "I then started to rub his legs, asked him if he felt me touching his legs. He said no."
As Dewey and others tended to the boy, police chased the Mustang to 51st Street and Telegraph Avenue, where Adams rammed a car carrying a woman and her twins before crashing into a parked car, police said. The woman and her children escaped major injury, police said.
Witnesses positively identified Adams, police said. Officers said they recovered a loaded handgun, a ski mask and cash at the scene of the crash.
Adams was arrested on suspicion of attempted murder, assault with a firearm, armed robbery, evading police, hit-and-run, auto theft and carrying a concealed firearm. His girlfriend, Maeve Clifford, 19, who was in the car with him, was arrested on suspicion of robbery. She allegedly stole shampoo and conditioner from a Berkeley store earlier this year, court records show.
North Oakland has largely avoided the wave of violence afflicting other parts of the city, but residents have expressed concern about a recent surge of crime. On Dec. 29, state Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata of Oakland was the victim of a carjacking one block from where the police chase of Adams ended Thursday.
Holly Lloyd, 39, of Piedmont, whose 8-year-old daughter would have had her piano lesson later Thursday afternoon at the music school, said Friday that she was experiencing a "feeling of powerlessness and wondering who to go to look for help."
In a statement Friday, Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums extended his condolences to the boy and his family. "I am deeply troubled when anyone in this city is harmed by violence, but this shooting is especially tragic," he said. "This is yet another reminder why public safety is on the hearts and minds of all Oakland residents and why it is the top priority for my office."
Adams' mother, who didn't want her name used, said Friday, "Yeah, he's a nice son, but I don't want to make any comments at this point."
In an undated essay included in an Alameda County court file for a marijuana-possession case, Adams wrote, "The truth is black males, especially young ones, have a harder time finding good working situations. We need to find ways to motivate young black males to face the challenges and obstacles in their way. The situation can only get worse if something is not done. Not everybody can be Michael Jordan."
Adams is no stranger to the criminal justice system. He has prior convictions for gun possession and for driving under the influence. After he pleaded no contest to felony evading arrest in 2006 for fleeing from an Emeryville police officer, Superior Court Judge Leo Dorado noted that he had also run from or physically resisted a California Highway Patrol officer in San Leandro and police in Albany and Berkeley.
"If you get in trouble, if you do something wrong, you're just going to have to take it, accept it. Don't run," the judge warned as he sentenced Adams to six months in jail and three years' probation. "People get killed doing this, and we're not going to - I'm not going to - let you endanger anybody else."
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