Halloween night 2019, at 6:45 p.m.: I didn’t know that would be the last time I would talk to my son Harrison Schmidt and that he would be a victim of gun violence. I don’t know why, but I just felt a need for him to come home. He assured me he would be home, and we said our “I love yous.”
He was driving when a truck cut him off and slammed on the brakes. At the light, this coward shot my son in the head and drove away. The news media came out but didn’t think it was “news-worthy.” An 18-year-old boy being shot in the head at 7:30 p.m. in front of trick or treaters.
I called and texted until finally filing a missing person’s report at 6 a.m. I was told my son was in ICU under “Unknown.” There had been so many shootings that night; his license and insurance information had not been given to the hospital. I found my son, in the dark, alone. My sweet boy fought for his life for 18 days. I had to bury my son on his 19th birthday, November 23, 2019.