Mother forgives teen who accidentally shot and killed her 15-year-old son

Monday, July 15, 2019
Mom forgives teen who accidentally shot and killed 15-year-old son
"People make bad mistakes and bad choices all the time. He's a kid, and I forgive him and I love him because he reached out to me."

SPRING, Texas (KTRK) -- Two days ago, Christelyn Palmer drove her 15-year-old brother to visit a friend. "My baby brother wanted to drive," she recalled.

Later that day, her family was told Jordan Angel had been shot and killed.

Investigators said he had been shot, allegedly by his 17-year-old friend, as he was playing with a gun.

RELATED: 'Kids playing with guns' when 15-year-old shot to death: HCSO

The older teenager was arrested and charged with manslaughter, and released on bond this weekend.

"Today, he reached out to me," Kim Booker, Jordan's mother said in an exclusive interview with ABC13 Eyewitness News. She agreed to meet with him, and said what she saw was a person grieving the loss of a friend. "He loved his friend. People make bad mistakes and bad choices all the time. He's a kid, and I forgive him and I love him because he reached out to me."

"The pain for him, and the pain for us is different," she said, "But two families are hurting."

Jordan was a good kid, according to his family. He loved playing football and basketball in youth leagues. He hoped to play at Klein High School, where his mother said he would have been a sophomore.

He also loved his family. "I could pass by him in the night and he would wake up and see if I needed any help."

Booker is partially paralyzed and was just starting to walk again. "He didn't want me to fall down. He took care of me," she said.

The mother and son moved in with her sister after the death of Jordan's dad last year.

Now, the family is facing another funeral that no one could have anticipated.

"Jordan dreamed of playing sports in college and going pro," she said of her son's dreams.

His sister said Jordan's death has impacted everyone who loved him. "His teachers and friends from school have been affected. People loved Jordan," said Palmer. "That's his legacy, but it's also that guns are not toys. What happened has touched everyone who knew him."

A GoFundMe account has been set up to help with expenses. Today, the mother of the friend charged in Jordan's death shared their GoFundMe appeal on her own Facebook page, asking that people donate to help with funeral costs.

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