Welcome to the Reader‘s morning briefing for Tuesday, February 14, 2017. Happy Valentine’s Day!
Activist Jedidiah Brown is reportedly OK after apparent suicide attempt
Neighborhood activist Jedidiah Brown is doing better after his suicide attempt near Buckingham Fountain shut down Lake Shore Drive in the Loop for an hour and a half Sunday evening. “I’m not wanting to die anymore but whoa the pain is cutting deep,” Brown wrote in a Facebook post Monday afternoon. He was reportedly extremely upset after the death of a nephew and the difficult work of being a south-side activist while violence is surging, according to DNAinfo Chicago. “This freed a part of me that must take away the power of pain in passion,” he wrote Monday. “I must get my healing but I need Chicago to truly see why we are getting no better.” The 11-year-old cousin of another antiviolence activist, Rachel Williams, was shot over the weekend. [DNAinfo Chicago] [NBC News]
