Alex Durante, 15, male, was shot on the afternoon of August 28, 2025, in Chicago’s Canaryville/New City area after a group of boys gathered in a vacant lot off the 600 block of West 47th Street near Union Avenue. Shortly before 4 p.m., a confrontation unfolded and someone opened fire; Alex was struck in the hip and a 12-year-old boy was shot in the chest.
Both were rushed in critical condition to Comer Children’s Hospital, and by the next morning the Cook County Medical Examiner identified Alex as the teen who had died. The shooting happened about a block from Tilden High School, shortly after dismissal, though police said the boys were not connected to the school.
Witnesses described the scene as chaotic, with the boys scattering as gunshots rang out, and neighbors trying to stanch the bleeding before paramedics arrived. Initial reports noted detectives were speaking to a person of interest as they pieced together how the group encounter in the lot turned into gunfire.
Within hours, police arrested 19-year-old Daniel Navas Maiver. Authorities said he was taken into custody just after midnight on Friday and later charged with first-degree murder and attempted murder. Investigators cited surveillance footage and witness accounts that showed a man following the boys, slipping into the vacant lot, and firing repeatedly. Prosecutors said an off-duty Chicago police officer saw the suspect running, and subsequent searches recovered distinctive clothing, a 9mm handgun linked by ballistics to the shooting, and an admission from the accused. A judge ordered him detained while the case proceeds.
Police and prosecutors have said there is no evidence the boys were armed or threatened the gunman. Alex’s death and the wounding of the 12-year-old drew swift attention across the city as one more illustration of daylight violence affecting children; his name and age were added to local and national gun-violence records in the days that followed.
