MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. – A 15-year-old spent his Wednesday night sitting in a parking lot, just a few feet from where he witnessed his older brother being fatally shot the day before.
Tears fell down the teen's face as he watched dozens of mourners hold a vigil for Roderick Sweeting, 17. They held candles, called for an end to gun violence and placed stuffed animals and red roses on the spot where Sweeting died.
Nearby was Roderick's mother, Tammy Sweeting.
"We would like justice for Roderick because he didn't deserve this," Tammy Sweeting said. "He had a career ahead of him."
Roderick Sweeting is the second son Tammy Sweeting has lost to gun violence.
She said Roderick Sweeting had just gotten dropped off by a school bus in the 17600 block of Northwest 25th Avenue when he was shot and killed.
"They would always give me a kiss, and I tell them I love them and then they go to school, and that's the last time I seen him alive," Tammy Sweeting said.
She said Roderick Sweeting and her 15-year-old son were about to get haircuts.
Roderick Sweeting brought their backpacks inside their apartment when his brother saw three guys running out from the apartment building across the way, she said.
Tammy Sweeting said her younger son yelled to alert Roderick Sweeting, but he had Beats headphones on and didn't hear him.
Roderick Sweeting was fatally shot outside the apartment where he, his brother, sister and mother have lived for the past six years.
Tammy Sweeting said she ran out of her home and found Roderick on the ground bleeding.
She said her younger son told Roderick Sweeting to get up, and he shook his head once and stopped moving.
An officer who was in the area heard the shots fired and went over to help. Roderick was pronounced dead at the scene.
Tammy Sweeting said her oldest son, Anthony Thompson, 20, was fatally shot in Miami on June 11, 2011. She said he was visiting his godmother and walked outside, where he was struck in the head by a stray bullet.
Tammy Sweeting said she never spoke publicly about the shooting and the gunman was never arrested.
She hopes this time around she will see justice for Roderick.
"They say you're not supposed to question God, but that's where I'm at right now in my life. Why?" Tammy Sweeting said. "This is nothing I would want no parent to experience."
Family and friends echo Tammy Sweeting's frustrations, as they called for an end to youth violence.
"Every day I look on the news and I see our teens are being murdered for no apparent reason," Roderick Sweeting's cousin said.
According to Tammy Sweeting, her son wanted to be a scientist and excelled in biology. She said he previously attended Miami Norland Senior High School and most recently went to American Senior High School in Hialeah.
"You have to be careful what you do in the streets," Roderick Sweeting's classmate, Regis Palomino, said. "It has impacted me a lot because you don't know what is going to happen, so you have to be careful what you do."
Tammy Sweeting said she and Roderick Sweeting's father, whom she has been separated from for four years, raised him right and read from the Bible to him every morning.
"(I'm) just asking God for strength right now and I want those who did it to be brought to justice," Tammy Sweeting said.
According to Florida Department of Law Enforcement records, Roderick Sweeting had been arrested one time on a charge of grand theft with a firearm.
Anyone with information about the shooting is asked to call Miami-Dade Crime Stoppers at 305-471-TIPS.