SHOOTING OF CLASSMATE SHOCKS APOPKA HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS
By Maya Lazarovitz
The Apopka Chief, 20 February 2004
Students at Apopka High School were shocked and upset on Wednesday, February 18, upon learning of the shooting death of a classmate, according to John Edwards, AHS principal.
Lonnie Hillery, 16, a sophomore at AHS, was shot and killed on Tuesday, February 17, following a dispute with another student, Clyde Blount IV, 16, known as C.J. to his friends and family.
Clyde Blount III, 41, 203 W. 15th St., Apopka, father of C.J., was arrested less than two hours after the shooting. He was charged with first degree murder, said Jim Solomons, Orange County Sheriff's Office spokesman.
According to students at Apopka High, Hillery and the younger Blount had an ongoing dispute over another friend of theirs, a girl who told C.J. that Hillery was picking on her. The students said C.J. tried to defend the girl, and the situation escalated when the boys got into a fistfight after exiting a bus coming from AHS on Tuesday afternoon.
C.J. then went to tell his father, Clyde Blount III, that he was beaten up in the fight, Solomons said. Blount then got his gun, and the two got into the family minivan and drove around looking for Hillery, Solomons said. They found him at the intersection of Central Avenue and 20th Street, about a half a block from Phyllis Wheatley Elementary School, at about 2:30 p.m.
According to Solomons, Blount made a U-turn when he saw Hillery, and fired three to five rounds at the boy, one of which hit him in the back. A passerby in a pick-up truck took Hillery to Apopka Fire Station One, located on Fifth Street behind City Hall. He was then transported to Orlando Regional Medical Center in stable condition, but his condition quickly deteriorated, and he died at about 6:30 p.m., Solomons said.
Blount was arrested and charged with first-degree murder for the shooting.
"We've had some good cooperation, evidently, from some of the kids," Solomons said, adding that area residents provided information about Blount's location, and that he was arrested without incident.
"We are very upset that this happened," Edwards said, referring to himself and the AHS community.
"It's tragic. There was absolutely no reason for it; no reason at all. We want parents and adults to be good role models for the kids."
Edwards said he had extra counselors on hand to help the students deal with their grief, if they needed to, and he said an announcement was made telling the students to go to the family service center if they needed to talk to anyone.
Apopka pastors Freddie Filmore and James Hicks were at AHS to talk to students, and a counselor "followed the empty seat," Edwards said, by sitting in Hillery's classes to talk to students there about the shooting.
"They're just trying to help them cope," Edwards said about the counselors.
"Death is a hard thing to cope with. I'm not sure if there is an easy way to do it," Edwards said.
He added, "The students are upset and disappointed that an adult would lash out in this way. We're always telling the kids to refrain from violence in solving problems."
Nena Weinsteiger, a senior at AHS said, "I didn't know the kid, but I think it's ridiculous that ignorance went this far. They should have more programs to educate people not to do that. Stuff like that can happen anywhere, but that it happened two times in such a short period of time is disappointing," she said, referring to the November shooting death of AHS student Dwight L. Dicks, after he got into a fistfight with the 17-year-old nephew of Lafayette Mareese Johnson, 26, 1802 Hammon Drive, Apoka, who was charged with first-degree murder of the teen.
"I feel sorry for the kids in that community. Maybe people will learn from this," she added.
Lisandra Cruz, a junior at AHS, knew Hillery froma gym class they had together.
"It's funny knowing someone, and then having him not be here all of a sudden," she said. "I'm just scared because it could happen to anyone. He was just a kid, and fights can happen over the smallest things. It's [violence] not the best way to solve problems."
She added, "I was shocked when I found out, especially because it was someone's dad. I don't understand why the dad got involved, and why they [the Blounts] didn't go to the police or something."
Theresa Kelley, a senior at AHS said, "They shouldn't have been fighting, but that's not the dad's business. He shouldn't have gotten involved; he should have let them solve it by themselves. I feel bad that the kid died, even though I didn't know him, because everyone was crying when they found out. I feel sympathetic for his parents."
Crystal Pope, a senior at AHS, said she knew Hillery because he used to hang out with her cousin.
"It's stupid, because kids will be kids," she said.
"The dad should not have gotten involved, because it had been going on for weeks, and even when they were fighting they were still hanging out. He should have just let them solve it on their own. They would have been friends again. He shouldn't have gotten his gun," the AHS senior said.
Christina Rodriguez, a senior at AHS, said she talked to Hillery every once in a while, and that she was sad and upset by his murder.
"This is the second time something like this has happened in Apopka," she said, referring to Dicks' murder.
"He [the dad] should never have gotten into it in the first place. People need to watch their actions and be aware of what they do, because otherwise the can cause tragedy. People need to learn to ignore things, and put their differences aside," she said.
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