FBI creates online tip line to investigate September homicide outside Hillcrest High School
The FBI announced Tuesday the creation of a digital media tip line where individuals can upload files and information. The tip line requires submitters to attach an online file such as a photo, video or pdf testimony. It can be submitted anonymously.
Six months after 14-year-old Hillcrest High School freshman Marshawn Mitchell was killed in a shooting at his school, the FBI is asking the public to come forward with any information about the event.
Shortly after the Sept. 15 Homecoming football game at Hillcrest High School ended as students were gathered on the school’s front lawn, a dispute broke out leading to at least one shot being fired, according to witnesses and law enforcement. But no arrests have been made and little information has been provided publicly about the investigation.
The FBI announced Tuesday the creation of a digital media tip line where individuals can upload files and information. The tip line requires submitters to attach an online file such as a photo, video or pdf testimony. It can be submitted anonymously.
While the FBI has a variety of ways to assist police departments in investigations, the digital media tip line is particularly valuable in this case because of the ages of people involved, said special agent Siobhan Johnson with the public affairs office for the FBI.
“For a case like this, it’s going to be 100s of teenagers. And we know where teenagers go, so go phones,” said Johnson. “Where those phones are, there is going to be video, especially when people are dressed to the nines in their formal wear or perhaps they are excited … coming out of a football game.”
In news release, the FBI refrained from using much specific information about the case. Law enforcement said Mitchell may not have been the intended target and there were one or more shots fired, but would not say if one or more individuals were involved.
Johnson did not elaborate on the status of the investigation. Mitchell’s family and the Country Club Hills police chief did not respond to requests for comment.
hsanders@chicagotribune.com