Max Solomon Lewis University of Chicago student, Denver, Co native dies days after struck by stray bullet while commuting on CTA train from internship. No arrests.
A University of Chicago student has fatally succumbed to a gunshot wound he incurred after a stray bullet ripped through his subway-car window while commuting home from his summer internship according to reports.
Max Solomon Lewis, a 20-year-old junior from Denver, Colorado, passed away Sunday morning as a result of injuries he suffered from the bullet that pierced a window of the train at the 51st Street Green Line station on Thursday, the Chicago Sun-Times reported.
‘It’s a senseless tragedy for so many reasons,’ classmate Zach Cogan told the outlet.
Lewis, who was pursuing a double major in economics and computer science, had snagged a competitive internship at an investment firm in downtown Chicago for the summer. He had graduated two years earlier from Kent Denver School, a prestigious private school in Colorado and had his sights set in a career in the investment world.
Though he had the option to work from home, Lewis preferred to head into the office because he ‘loved getting to know as many people as he could,’ Cogan said.
‘He was incredibly special, and he was brave to the very end,’
The victim had been on his way home from work during rush hour Thursday on the Green line riding the CTA when the bullet struck his neck, police said.
‘I was told Max was shot and he was shot in the neck. And it was really bad,’ Cogan told the Denver Channel.
Lewis was taken to a nearby hospital, where his family and friends rushed to his side.
‘He was incredibly special, and he was brave to the very end,’ Cogan told the Denver Channel.
No suspects or a motive have been identified in the shooting, with police saying they don’t believe that Lewis was the intended target.
He is survived by his parents and a younger brother.
Friends remembered Lewis as a fixture on campus through his role as leader of Promontory Investment Research, a group that helps undergrad students produce and write research reports, as well as president of his fraternity, Alpha Epsilon Pi.
Unrelenting gun violence
He had already been looking forward to another big internship that he scored for next summer, friends said.
‘My latest conversations with him were so optimistic,’ friend Victoria Gin told the Chicago Sun-Times. ‘He loved the grind,’ Gin added.
Max’s shooting death comes as at least 100 people were shot over the July Fourth weekend in Chicago — including 18 people who died, ABC7 Chicago reported.
The number is up from the same weekend last year that saw 87 people shot, the outlet reported.
Lewis’s fraternity has launched a GoFundMe page which will donate part of the funds to benefit anti-gun violence efforts.
‘Chicago has so much gun violence, like every city. It’s so senseless,’ Cogan told the Denver Channel. ‘I can’t lose another friend to gun violence. I just can’t. It’s too much.’
Welcome to a brave new America where unrelenting gun violence is like a random sudden rain downpour that occasionally one gets drenched in or killed.
