NORWOOD PARK — A 17-year-old former student at Taft High School died Monday afternoon after he was discovered with a gunshot wound in his chest in Norwood Park on Monday afternoon, police and sources said.
Around 1:10 p.m., police found the teen unconscious in a parking lot in the 5500 block of North Harlem Avenue, just south of the Kennedy Expressway, according to Officer Michelle Tannehill, a Chicago Police spokeswoman.
The teen, who was enrolled in an alternative high school and lived in Sauganash, met someone in the parking lot behind the Taco Burrito King, 5509 N. Harlem Ave., when an argument ended in gunfire and the theft of the victim's car, according to a source close to the investigation.
A bag of marijuana was found next to the teen when police and paramedics arrived.
Police do not believe the teen was involved in a gang, sources say.
Police are looking for the teen's car, a black 2014 Hyundai.
The teen was taken to Lutheran General Hospital, where he died, officials said. He was identified as Anthony Heatherly, of the 5700 block of North Kingsdale Avenue, in Cook County Medical Examiner's records. He was pronounced dead at 2:15 p.m.
Heatherly, who attended Taft High School, played on the Norwood Park school's football and basketball teams, friends said.
Reached at Heatherly's home on a cul-de-sac in Sauganash on Tuesday, the teen's grandfather declined to speak to a reporter from DNAinfo Chicago.
Marilyn Falkenberg, a teacher at Taft, remembered Heatherly as a "nice kid."
"He was not the most motivated of students, but he was bright and funny and capable," Falkenberg said.
Heatherly was also mourned by members of the Chicagoland Petrolheads and Car Spotters group on Facebook, which was devoted to car lovers.
It's the second shooting in Norwood Park since July 2013, according to DNAinfo data.
Ald. Anthony Napolitano (41st) said he heard the first reports of the shooting while listening to the scanner in his office, and went to the parking lot where the teen was found wounded.
Napolitano said the incident would prompt him to renew his call for more officers to be assigned to the Jefferson Park (16th) Police District and oppose efforts from other aldermen to transfer officers from the Far Northwest Side to other areas of the city, where shootings jumped 80 percent since the first of the year.
"This is frightening," Napolitano said.
Police could not immediately provide additional information on the shooting.
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