Tykina Ali / Family photo
By LOU FOGLIA
Homicide Watch Chicago
Tykina Ali loved to laugh, family members recall.
And her mother, Tykia Watts, said the 20-year-old was persistent at getting others to laugh with her.
“If you was down, she would bring you up.” Watts said. “If you would see her down, then you’d know something was really wrong.”
Ali, of the 1600 block of West Ogden, was shot in the head Aug. 23 while riding in a vehicle in the 2600 block of South Kedzie, police said.
She later died after being brought to West Suburban Medical Center in Oak Park, according to police and the Cook County Medical Examiner’s Office.
Police said she had been a passenger in a vehicle when someone in another vehicle nearby fired shots.
On the day of Ali’s death, more than 200 people gathered with balloons, candles and posters for a memorial outside her elementary school, John Hay Community Academy, her mother said.
Even more people attended her funeral on Sept. 3.
“I got 300 obituaries for her funeral,” Watt’s said. “Everyone didn’t even get one.”
Watts said her daughter loved to eat and was always ‘hun-gy'.
Tykina Ali / Family photo
“She wouldn’t say hungry, she’d take the 'R' out,” Watts said.
Ali would often call her mother to check what was for dinner.
“I knew when I would see her name [on the phone] that’s what I was gonna hear,” she said.
Ali graduated from Austin Career Education Center in 2014. She was working at Blistex to earn money to attend Harold Washington College.
No one is in custody in connection with the shooting as Area Central detectives investigate. It was not known if she was the intended target.