Za'Shawn Alexander Sylva Coats
Age 15
Rockford, Illinois
Wanted to make his sister proud
He had struggled with his grades before, but he was just beginning to excel at Jefferson High. “He just wanted to make me proud,” his sister Je’Miya Wills wrote in a Facebook post.
He was sweet, innocent, kind, “surprisingly” funny and a joy to be around, his aunt Lavanda Michelle said.
On Jan. 21, 2019 – Martin Luther King Jr. Day – Za'Shawn Alexander Sylva Coats, 15, was walking down the street near a church with two friends in Rockford, Illinois. A car pulled up. It was just before 4 p.m. A gunshot fired from the vehicle struck Coats in the head, killing him.
