Dangerous Chicago School Commutes Revisited After Teen`s Rape

The sun had not yet risen over the city Tuesday when a 15-year-old girl left her home in the Belmont Cragin neighborhood and headed out in the dark toward her charter high school nearly 6 miles away.

Before she reached the end of her block, she was beaten, raped and left half-naked in the bitter cold. Her life-threatening injuries -- police say she remains in critical condition after undergoing emergency brain surgery -- have become a chilling reminder of the difficult and often dangerous journeys that thousands of Chicago children face each day in the name of quality education.

"These commutes have been going on a long time," said Julie Woestehoff, executive director of Parents United for Responsible Education. "We just accept it as a fact of life in this city, and that puts children at risk."

Across the city, thousands of students begin their pre-dawn journeys when most would expect children to be just waking up. Many told the Tribune that they travel in groups, take self-defense classes and follow routes carefully mapped by their parents in order to make it to school safely.

In the Woodlawn neighborhood, for example, Khalilah Manson leaves her home at 6 a.m. for her trip to Walter Payton College Prep on the Near North Side. The quickest route would be walking to the Red Line, but she takes two buses at her mom's request instead.

"It takes a little bit longer," Manson said. "But I guess it's safer, in my mom's opinion."

David Barboza, 17, must navigate a what he considers a dangerous three-block stretch between his Pilsen home and the Pink Line during his daily commute to and from Jones College Prep, a selective-enrollment school in the South Loop. Over the past three years, he has learned what he has to do to get home safely after dark.

"I'm just always looking straight ahead, not looking at cars, not having my hoodie on -- none of that stuff," he said.

Gang members sometimes "check" him at the "L" stop, he said.

"They ask me if I'm in a gang or anything. I'm like, 'No, I'm just getting home,'" he said.

Whenever possible, his mother, Nora Barboza, picks him up at the station. If she can't make it because of work obligations, she and David constantly send text messages so she can track his whereabouts.

"It's an everyday situation," Nora Barboza said. "But as a parent, the most important thing here is having that communication with your son and letting them know what the possibilities might be and how to react."

Brelynn Lowery, another Jones student, keeps her phone tucked away so as not to attract attention during her daily 15-minute train ride from her school to her Bronzeville home. She also keeps the music on her headphones low so she can hear what's going on around her.

Most mornings -- especially in wintertime -- her mother drives her the block from their home to the train stop. Kristen Lowery then waits until she can see her daughter go through the turnstiles before pulling away.

"I can see her body getting in the station. It gives me peace of mind," Kristen Lowery said. "I know that it can't prohibit things from happening, but at least I feel a little bit better knowing she's getting there safely."

After classes let out Wednesday at the Chicago High School for the Arts on the South Side, students chatted and joked in small groups on the snowy sidewalk outside the entrance on East 35th Street. Asked about safety concerns getting to and from school, the conversations turned more serious.

Several students have been robbed near the school after its 5 p.m. dismissal, prompting safety alerts from staff, students said. And about two hours before the school's dismissal Wednesday, a 15-year-old boy was shot in the leg in the 3800 block of South Calumet Avenue, less than a mile from the school.

Tyler Young, 16, said he'd learned to "play it smooth" walking to and from school. But the student, who is a visual artist, acknowledged concerns based on his classmates' experiences near the school.

"They kind of target us because we look like artsy kids," he said.

Such commutes, however, have been commonplace in Chicago for decades. The city's desegregation efforts nearly 40 years ago led to the creation of magnet schools and forced students to travel difficult distances if they wanted the best education the city could provide.

First lady Michelle Obama, who grew up in the South Shore neighborhood, recently recalled her daily trek to Whitney Young High School, a selective-enrollment campus on the Near North Side.

"My school was way across the other side of the city from where I lived," she said during an appearance at a Washington, D.C., high school. "So at 6 a.m. every morning, I had to get on a city bus and ride for an hour, sometimes more, just to get to school. And I was willing to do that because I was willing to do whatever it took for me to go to college."

In addition to magnet and selective-enrollment schools, the growth of charter schools has increased the number of students trekking across the city.

The girl involved in the Belmont Cragin attack, for example, attends one of the charter high schools in the Noble network. The school's principal sent a letter home to parents Wednesday asking them to remind their children to take extra precaution when traveling to and from school. The Tribune is not naming the high school so as not to identify the girl.

The attack happened less than half a block from one of Chicago Public Schools' Safe Passage routes, patrolled areas that were set up for the current school year to help students who have longer walks after dozens of elementary school consolidations.

But Safe Passage workers don't start work until 6:45 a.m. -- about a half-hour after the girl left her house to catch the CTA bus to school.

Ald. Ariel Reboyras, 30th, who represents the ward where the attack occurred, said he is concerned about students traveling to school in the dark and without the protection of Safe Passage monitors. He plans to raise the issue Thursday at a community meeting scheduled to be held at Northwest Community Church.

"I'm hoping we can discuss the Safe Passage routes and times, because it's dark at 6 a.m. or 6:30 a.m. We should get them there a half-hour earlier," he said. "It should make a difference."

Detectives believe the girl was hit in the head while walking down the street to grab a bus at Long and Fullerton avenues. She was then dragged into a backyard and assaulted. She was found lying near the back door, bleeding from the back of her head and covered in blood.

The girl was still wearing a jacket but her pants were off, according to the police report. She was awake "but very lethargic, possibly suffering from hypothermia," the police report said.

Blood was splattered across the yard and down the gangway along the house, the report said. The man who lives at the address where she was found said some blood was on his door, close to his doorbell.

The girl's book bag was lying on a snowbank, and a set of keys, a pair of gloves and one of the girl's boots were strewn around the patio walkway, the police report said. Officers said they found a condom wrapper at the end of the gangway.

Police tried to question her about the attack, but she could only make one statement.

"On the way to school," she said.

Tribune reporters Stacy St. Clair, Rosemary Regina Sobol, Carlos Sadovi, Noreen S. Ahmed-Ullah, Katherine Skiba and Jeremy Gorner contributed.

jjperez@tribune.com mmanchir@tribune.com asege@tribune.com

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