A reward is being offered for information as Chicago police develop “strong leads” in the Little Village shooting death of an 8-year-old girl over the weekend.
Melissa Ortega was a third-grader at Zapata Academy. Family said she had just arrived in Chicago from Mexico back in August, trying to live out the American Dream.
But Saturday afternoon, she was shot in the head by a stray bullet as she walked with her mother near 26th Street and Pulaski Road.
Her mother, Aracely Leaños, spoke to Univision Network’s Despierta America about her loss and heartbreak, with the pain in her voice almost too much to bear.
“Me arrebató mi vida entera. Me quito lo más hermoso. Me quito mi motor de vida por el que yo me levantaba todos los días a seguir adelante. Me quito una vida llena de sueños,” she said, meaning, “He took away my entire life. He took away the most beautiful part of it. He took away my purpose for being. The reason I got up every day. He took away a life full of dreams.”
Monday morning, her family released a statement saying in part, “Melissa hoped for a better life here: she wanted to learn English, she wanted to experience Chicago snow, she wanted to get a build-a-bear, she wanted to make Tik Tok dances with her friends. At age 8, she was a girl full of hope and had her whole life ahead of her. She sought to achieve the American Dream but was instead given American Violence.
