Edwin Cook / Submitted photo
BY CHANTELLE NAVARRO
Homicide Watch Chicago
Drummer Edwin Cook wanted to go to college to pursue a career in music, family said.
“Ever since he was little, the whole family can remember him getting two sticks and just drumming … on a pot, the floor, your head if he could,” said Cook’s aunt, Johneece Cobb. “He would beat on everything.”
Cook, 19, will never get the chance to pursue a career in music because he was fatally shot Jan. 21 in the 6600 block of South Oakley Avenue in the Chicago Lawn community, authorities said.
Police said he was standing on a sidewalk when a black vehicle pulled up and a gunman exited and opened fire about 9 a.m. that day.
Cook, of the 6600 block of South Bell Avenue, was shot multiple times and died at the scene, according to the Cook County medical examiner’s office.
“He was not a gang member,” Cobb said. “He was a victim of where he lived.”
Family members said Cook had dropped his mother off at work about an hour earlier, and was on his way to school when he was shot.
His last words to his mother were, “I’ll see you at four,” when he got home from school, Cobb said.
Edwin Cook as a child / Family photo
As a child, Cook attended Claremont Academy Elementary School, where he was a member of a drum line, family said.
“Our whole family loved music, but he was just so inspired by it,” Cobb said. “He wanted to go to Columbia College Chicago and purse his career in music.”
As a youth, Cook got into trouble, but eventually refocused his attention on school, family said.
“He knew he messed up in school,” Cobb said. “He matured and came up to the realization that school was the only way out.”
Cobb noted that Cook’s schoolwork improved tremendously up until his death.
“He had a passion for school, but you can tell that peer pressure was getting to him,” Cook said.
Nobody has been charged for the murder. Area Central detectives are investigating.