Jamal Jackson’s sleep was brutally disrupted. The 15-year-old is in critical condition after an SUV slammed through his bedroom at the corner of Cerise Avenue and Chef Mentuer.
In a heartbreaking statement to WDSU, his mother Cierra Patterson, who was away from home at the time, said, “All she heard was loud glass noise, and when she called me on the phone because I wasn’t there, she just said that Jamal was under the car.”
Around four in the morning last Sunday, according to the New Orleans Police Department, a 53-year-old alleged drunk driver named Cedrick Marshall crashed through a fence and into the child’s bedroom.
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According to his mother, Jackson, who just started attending Edna Karr, was excited about the next academic year and wanted to join the drill team and football.
She bemoaned the injustice of her son, who was always indoors. “He don’t get into no trouble. He don’t hang with people, he stays inside, that’s like his comfort zone,” Patterson said.
“He should have called an Uber if he knew he was too intoxicated. He should’ve never got behind a wheel.”
The police verified that Marshall remained at the site and reportedly failed a sobriety test, even though they did not disclose the speed at which he was driving at the time of the incident.
He faces charges of reckless driving and vehicular negligent injury.
The distraught mother declared that she would support her “strong boy” in his current struggle for survival.
“I’m praying that he gets through this. He going to get through this, I have faith in this. He’s going to walk out this hospital with me. He’s not leaving no other way,” Patterson stated.
