The neighbors kept saying it: Richard Montclair, 18, was a good kid who stood up to the gang-bangers and tried to keep them away from his sister, Michelle.
Police said Montclair was murdered because of it early Saturday, a block away from his Southwest Side home.
“This is where they shot my big brother through the heart,” said a weeping Bobby Montclair, 11. “They threw a beer bottle at him, and then it all happened and they shot him through the heart.”
Bobby and his brother Eddie, 9, stood before a makeshift memorial: a beer bottle, flowers and a wood cross draped in the yellow tape police used to mark the shooting scene at 78th Street and Hamlin.
Wentworth Area detectives still were trying to piece it together. But they seemed to know what family and neighbors knew:
Montclair had been trying for some time to keep local gang members away from Michelle, 14.
“The gang-bangers didn’t like that,” Bobby said.
Shortly before 2 a.m. Saturday, somebody threw a beer bottle at Montclair as he drove by. He got out of his car to see about it.
Montclair was pronounced dead of a single gunshot wound at 2:21 a.m. at Christ Hospital and Medical Center, Oak Lawn.
“That seems to be how it happened,” said police Sgt. Jack Ridges. “It was a confrontation of some kind. He was trying to protect his sister, as far as we know.”
Suspects still were being sought. The neighborhood could only weep and wonder.
“What kind of kid was he?” said Tom Heinrich, a paramedic. “Let me put it this way. Why am I standing out in the middle of the street crying like a baby?
“It was the biggest waste of a life I can imagine. Rick had everything going for him. He was just so smart, so nice. And he stood for all the right things.”
Agreed another neighbor, Lawrence Nichols: “Rick was trying to protect more than his sister, his brothers. He was trying to protect the whole neighborhood. He was that kind of kid. He hated the gangs, and he let them know it.
“All I know is, if you needed something, if you needed a volunteer, there was Rick, ready to go. I got a 2 1/2-year-old daughter, and he came over and played with her all the time.
“Rick was just the worst person this could happen to.”
Neighbors said Montclair, a recent graduate of Bogan High School, was always helping them with their cars.
“And he helped with everything else,” said Tim Kelly, a carpenter. “He was a smart kid, good with his hands. He was the kind of guy you liked having around.”
Montclair’s mother, Diane, sat at the kitchen table of her bungalow and wept at the sight of a Polaroid photo of her oldest son.
“You think it looks like a good neighborhood,” she said. “There are gang-bangers everywhere. That’s how it is in every neighborhood now. The police don’t do anything. Nobody does anything.
“And he’s all gone now. All gone.”
Little sister Michelle was alone in a bedroom, talking to no one. Little brother Eddie stood off to one side. His eyes were red. He just stared.
“Tomorrow’s my birthday,” he finally said. It didn’t seem to matter anymore.