AURORA, Colo. — Authorities on Tuesday identified the 16-year-old boy killed in a double shooting in Aurora over the weekend. No arrests have been made.
The Arapahoe County Coroner’s Office identified the victim as Joel Adrian Renderos Villa.
He and another 16-year-old boy were shot while they were in their vehiclein the area of E. 12th Avenue and N. Ironton Street. It happened around 7 p.m. Friday.
Villa was found in the driver’s seat when officers arrived and pronounced dead at the scene, according to the Aurora Police Department.
The second victim, who was in the passenger seat, showed up at the hospital a short time later and is expected to survive.
READ MORE | Denver organization tries to fight a rising tide of teenage violence as tragedies increase
Damian Alcazar, who lives across the street from where the incident occurred, said he came outside after the shooting and witnessed the car the boys were in, rolling right through his fence and homemade library, barely grazing his home before it came to a stop.
"One guy came out of the passenger side, and I asked him if he was alright," Alcazar said.
The passenger went into Alcazar's home after the crash, bleeding from his hand.
"I gave him a bunch of towels, but he was pacing back-and-forth. I told him just to stay in one place because he was bleeding everywhere," he said.
Aurora police are still investigating the circumstances that led up to the shooting and have not released suspect information at this time.
Friday’s shooting was one of five separate incidents in the Denver metro area over the weekend. Two other teens, a 15-year-old and an 18-year-old, were shot in two other separate shootings in Aurora the same weekend. The 15-year-old is in critical condition.
Villa was a member of Struggle of Love, an organization founded in Denver to help stem the tide of teenage violence in Denver and Aurora. The organization was founded by Joel Hodges more than a decade ago.
"It's tough because we develop relationships with these kids and then people — I don't think they really understand," said Hodges. "All these kids know somebody who's been killed, unfortunately. And a good number of these kids also know somebody who has killed somebody. And so there's a huge trauma in that."
