Teen Shooting Victim Needs Community Help

Almost a month after a youth was shot while walking to a friend’s house, he remains hospitalized. His family says his condition shows signs of promise but they need your help. Fifteen-year-old third form student, Kassman Gill was walking on Magazine Road on the afternoon of August sixteenth when another youth on a bike rode up to him and shot him in the back of the neck. The bullet left him paralyzed and in a critical condition. Today, his father, Cecil Gill made another public appeal for financial support to help defray the cost of the mounting medical bills and the advanced treatment that his son will need when doctors are able to stabilize him enough for the flight abroad.

On the Phone: Cecil Gill, Father of Shooting Victim

 “We have a big bill. We have other bills, you know, the mother is not working. I am not fully, fully employed, and able to do what I used to do. And then we look forward to preparing for the eventuality of taking him abroad. So it is a long, long road ahead of us. The last estimate that we had just to fly him on an air ambulance was about U.S. thirty-five thousand [dollars]. So, that’s a lot of money. According to the doctor, they want to try and see if they could reduce the sedation slowly so that they can give his lungs – or give him a chance to try to breathe a little bit on his own. His oxygen level is holding up. He’s doing better than last week. It’s still a very, very iffy situation, you know because he’s not stabilized. He’s not stable. That’s where we want to go. His lungs are still not fully expanded and there’s still a slight infection because today he had a fever.”

Gill extends gratitude to the staff at the K.H.M.H. Intensive Care Unit where his son remains hospitalized. Anyone who would like to assist can contact Gill at 605-3186.