After search, family finds body of 18-year-old outside Central City ...

After hours of knocking on doors and searching?abandoned houses in?Central City,?a search team comprised of family, friends and neighbors finally?found?18-year-old Jamal Christian, who had been missing since Sunday. Lying face?down behind some bushes outside an elementary school playground, Christian was dead, shot once in the back, police said.

New Orleans police are investigating whether Christian?was injured Sunday night during a shooting that followed a second-line parade near South Robertson and St. Andrew streets.

According to John Gagliano, chief investigator for the Orleans Parish coroner's office, the gunshot wound indicated that Christian was shot 24 to 36 hours before his body was found outside the Mahalia Jackson Early Childhood & Learning Center in the 2400 block of Jackson Avenue.

Christian's family had reported him missing Monday about 8 p.m., said police spokesman Frank Robertson III.

Following the Sunday shooting, police had actively looked for a second gunshot victim after witnesses reported that two men had been shot, though only one had been located. That victim had been shot in the foot, Robertson said.

"We exhausted all kinds of man hours like we do with any missing person case," Robertson said. "This case was relatively new. I don't think we had done fliers as of yet, but it's a process we do."

But neighbors criticized the police response, saying they saw officers driving around the streets near the shooting, but never walking the neighborhood on foot.

Christian's mother, Tyanka Lewis, 37, said she went to the police station after learning her son was missing on Monday and begged officers to help the family search the dark neighborhood streets.

"They said, 'All we can do is put in a missing persons report and leave it up to Homicide (Division)," Lewis said.

Lewis said the last time she saw her son was Friday, as he was boarding a bus to visit his father across town, as he did every weekend.

"I wish I hugged him. He's 18, he's out of that hugging stage," she said. "Now I just feel bad that I didn't hug him."

A neighbor, Harold Augustine, said he joined the family in searching for Christian Monday night. The family had gone door-to-door seeking help, neighbors said.

"We searched all last night, in every abandoned house around here," Augustine said.

After a neighbor spotted Christian's sneakers peeking out from the bushes, "We all just pulled back," Augustine said. "We was all crying, shedding a little tear. I went to shaking. That was real cold, he was a little boy."

Security officers at the Mahalia Jackson Early Childhood & Learning Center did not see the body when they walked the perimeter of the school Monday and Tuesday as they do every day, said Stanley Smith, interim superintendent of the Orleans Parish School Board.

The center, which has students in prekindergarten and kindergarten and also includes a health center, library and some state offices, was on lockdown throughout Tuesday, Smith said.

"The kids are not aware of anything going on," Smith said, noting the school had immediately notified parents of the murder investigation via text message, voicemail and email.

Footage from the school's surveillance system, which Smith said is recording 24 hours a day, seven days a week, will be turned over to police to aid the investigation.

Anyone with information on this crime can contact Homicide Detective Barret Morton at 504.658.5300 or Crimestoppers at 504.822.1111.

Naomi Martin can be reached at nmartin@timespicayune.com or 504.826.3452.

Source: http://www.nola.com/crime/index.ssf/2012/09/family_of_18-year-old_murder_v.html

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