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News (Media Awareness Project) - US NY: Marshal shoots teen mistaking candy for gun
Title:US NY: Marshal shoots teen mistaking candy for gun
Published On:1997-11-10
Source:Orange County Register
Fetched On:2008-09-07 20:00:23
MARSHAL SHOOTS TEEN,MISTAKING CANDY FOR GUN

ACCIDENT:

The highschool soccer player was eating a Three Musketeers bar when he
walked past a fugitivehunting task force.

NEW YORKA federal marshal shot a teenager walking down the street eating
a Three Musketeers candy bar after reportedly mistaking the silver wrapper
for a gun.

Andre Burgess, a highschool soccer star, was in fair condition with a leg
wound Saturday at Jamaica Hospital.

"It's sick," Burgess, 17, said from his hospital bed. "You can't even walk
down the street and eat a candy bar anymore."

The Queens district attorney and the U.S. Marshals Service are
investigating the shooting, representatives of each agency said Saturday.

"This whole thing happened without a provocation," said Burgess' lawyer,
David Godosky. "Mr. Burgess is totally a victim in this case."

Deputy U.S. Marshal William Cannon, a fiveyear veteran assigned to the
Newark, N.J. office, was put on leave with pay after the shooting, Marshal
Service spokesman Dave Branham said Saturday in an interview from
Washington. The Marshals Service wouldn't discuss other details.

Published reports said Cannon was part of a federal task force hunting for
a fugitive from a 1982 shooting of a customs agent when the teeager passed
by the investigators Thursday night.

Burgess walked past the marshals' car with the candy bar in his hands, and
Cannon shot him once in the leg, believing the teenager was carrying a
weapon, according to published reports.

"He didn't give me a chance to react," Burgess said. "I turned to see what
was up, and boom, I'm hit and fell to the ground."

"I'm laying there bleeding, waiting to go to the hospital, and he's shaking
hands with the other cops, or agents, who, whatever they were," Burgess
told The New York Times.

Burgess, the goalkeeper of the Hillcrest High School soccer team, is
worried that the injury may affect his chance to play in college. The
shooting has already knocked him out of the playoffs.

His coach, Howard Warhaftig, said it would "be nice if they said they were
sorry."
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