Damien “Dae Dae” Abenante-Villa was a 14-year-old boy from Chicago who spent a spring weekend visiting relatives in Whiting, Indiana, expecting family time and a birthday celebration, not the last walk of his life. Before sunrise on March 23, 2024, he was with a small group of kids and teens—family and friends—moving along a quiet residential stretch near the 1600 block of LaPorte Avenue, close to Ohio Avenue, headed toward a nearby park.
The stillness broke with two sharp pops.
Neighbors and witnesses later described the moment as sudden and brutal: Damien was struck in the chest, and the group around him scattered in panic as a figure in a red sweatshirt was seen running away. When officers arrived around 5:30 a.m., the scene looked like life had been dropped mid-step—white shoes and a cell phone left on the sidewalk, shell casings found nearby, and no weapon recovered. Damien was rushed to St. Catherine Hospital in East Chicago, but he did not survive; the Lake County Coroner’s Office ruled the death a homicide.
In the weeks that followed, grief spilled out onto the very block where the gunfire had sounded. At a vigil, candles flickered and balloons rose into the night as Damien’s mother, Amanda Abenante, pleaded for someone—anyone—who knew what happened to come forward, describing the hollow shock of waiting for answers that never seemed to arrive. The kids who had been walking with him that morning weren’t physically hit, but family members said they were left carrying the trauma of watching it happen.
Investigators later focused on security footage captured about a block away: a black Nissan driving toward Indianapolis Boulevard just after the shooting. Police traced the vehicle to a relative of Leonardo Nunez, and detectives said the driver appeared to be a younger, light-skinned man with distinct facial features, which they compared to Nunez’s BMV photo. Court records also alleged phone-location data placed Nunez in the area at the time, and that he sought treatment at a Chicago hospital on March 24 for a gunshot wound. A witness also told police there had been “beef” involving someone called “Adonis,” described as Nunez’s brother, adding another thread investigators tried to untangle in the aftermath.
On May 17, 2024, the U.S. Marshals Service took Nunez, 20, into custody at his home on Chicago’s North Side, after Whiting police said he was the person who shot Damien during that early-morning walk. A criminal case was unsealed on May 24 after Nunez was extradited from the Cook County Jail; he was charged with one count of murder and held without bond, with court filings noting his attorney petitioned for a bail review hearing.
Records and memorial listings differ on whether the death date is recorded as March 23 or March 24, 2024, but they agree on the central tragedy: a teenager’s life ended in Whiting, and the people who loved him have had to learn how to breathe around the absence he left behind.
