Somewhere, possibly still in Harlem, a gun man, possibly a young man, is walking around, nervous with the knowledge that it is he who took the life of 13-year-old Chris Owens.

“As a parent, I am asking the streets and city of New York to help me catch a child killer,” said Chris Foye, whose son Chris Owens was the victim of errant gun violence. The grieving father blasted his son’s killer, saying, “He’s a coward. Only a coward shoots into a crowd and runs off. He’s not a man. He’s a child killer, and we are here today to catch a child killer. He wasn’t a gangster, he wasn’t tough … he shot into a crowd and killed a 13-year-old. I want the streets to turn him over. I’m talking to Bloods, Crips, Latin Kings, gang members, whoever–tell ’em. He’s a child killer, and he’s a coward. We should never tolerate the murder of children. We are going to change the culture of disregard for women and children.”

A vigil was held on Friday night, April 26, on the corner of 121st Street and Adam Clayton Powell Boulevard to mark the fourth anniversary of the murder of yet another inner-city young person.

It was close to where young “Booba”–as Chris was known to friends and loved ones–was hit in the head by a stray bullet at a Harlem barbecue. The popular teen had been hanging out at the cookout that warm spring evening. He was chilling with his friends, had just called his mother, Gail Owens, and asked if he could stay out a little later. She told him no, but Owens dawdled some more. Then when a trigger-happy individual got to letting off shots into a crowd, tragically, the poor Academy for Collaborative Education student caught a bullet.

“I’m hurting,” Gail Owens told the AmNews. “He was a good boy. He was in a gifted class. He was on the honor roll. Gradating from junior high to high school. It was a horrible feeling seeing all the graduates and my son’s cap and gown there. I have three college graduates. I thought he was going to be the fourth, but they took his life.

“I would rally for [the killer] to turn himself in. I know he can’t sleep.”

Chris Owens’ funeral at Harlem’s Convent Baptist Church was heart-wrenching; family members, school friends and teachers shook with grief as tears fell. The devastation was palatable.

The same week, rapper T.I. attended the Rev. Al Sharpton’s National Action Network’s anti-violence rally and stated, “You don’t just kill a man, you destroy a family!”

“This is the worst day of my life, April 26. I lost my son and I have no other option than to bring justice to my family,” said Foye. “From here to May 3, we honor his legacy.”

On May 3, 2009 doctors turned off the life support machine on the brain dead teen.

At the vigil, a local resident, Malik, asked, “Where are the men in the community? We need to know who we are [as a people] so whether there are guns here or not, there isn’t an appetite for it. “

He told the AmNews, “The men are going to have to come out. The women have always been out; that’s nothing new. The men have to come out and take a stance against guns. It can’t be a meeting about a meeting about another meeting. Something has to come out of it. Whether we take this block or a block in another neighborhood, it has to be taken over immediately. That’s the only way you are going to get men involved.”

Jackie Rowe-Adams from Harlem Mothers S.A.V.E. chastised the community for not speaking up in the case. Malik, the uptown activist who lost two sons to gun violence said, “We need men like yourself, people to step up and stop being afraid.”

Pastor Vernon Williams from Perfect Peace Ministry said, “There is a problem. We have been standing out here for an hour and a crowd has not gathered. If there was a fight out here, everybody would be here. There’s a problem predicated on fear. It’s a mental problem, a social problem, it’s a problem only we can fix.”

Foye, president and founder of the Chris S. Owens Foundation, continued, “We must let people who commit murders and offenses against our children know we as a community will not tolerate the murder of our children.”

Also present at the vigil was Commissioner Kevin O’Conner of the Juvenile Justice Division and a sergeant from the 28th Precinct, who were stopping people on the street and showing them the $12,000 reward poster.

“There were over 300 people out here,” O’Conner told the AmNews. “Somebody knows something–who killed Chris. We need more community involvement.”

Foye has been working to get legislation in place that says if someone shoots recklessly and hits someone, they should get a mandatory 25-to-life sentence. “I took my son’s death to the White House. I told first lady Michele Obama that my son was shot and killed in Brooklyn due to excesses out here. She knows what we are doing here, and she is supportive,” he said.

Foye said his Chris S. Owens Foundation works for and with the community. They hold events, tournaments, financial awareness programs and toy drives–all efforts trying to keep the youth occupied and off the streets.

Foye concluded, “We have the ‘We the People’ movement. The elected officials failed to protect the people, but we have the streets behind us.”