According to family relatives, the eight-year-old kid crippled in the Fourth of July parade shooting in Highland Park is struggling emotionally as he adjusts to the new reality of his existence.
Cooper Roberts, whose spine was severed when Robert Crimo, 21, shot him through the abdomen in July, feels ‘hopless, sad, and angry as the reality of his existence sets in,’ according to an update posted yesterday on the boy’s GoFundMe page.
Cooper experiences continual agony. It is excruciating to witness,’ his relatives stated. ‘He still has internal damage and slow-healing wounds.’
In the 44 days since Cooper was shot, his family has posted consistent updates, revealing in horrific detail the injuries that have left him paralyzed below the waist.
Cooper’s family stated that the outpouring of public support he has gotten continues to make him happy, and they uploaded photographs of him giving a thumbs up from a wheelchair and smiling in a standing-wheelchair. In addition, he was recently reunited with George, his French bulldog. Cooper’s family reported that he is beginning to grasp the realities of his new life as he endures arduous physical and occupational therapy while navigating around a number of life-supporting tubes implanted in his body.
His mom reported that he is beginning to ask questions like, “What will I do during recess?”
The’mental and emotional distress’ of the boy’s experience and the realizations of what he has lost are claimed to be taking their toll.
Cooper is an eight-year-old child who is feeling hopeless, depressed, and angry as the reality of his existence sets in, according to his family.
His family stated that they are revealing Cooper’s harrowing struggle to show the world what happens to shooting victims like him.
Being shot by a sniper involves multiple layers of cruelty. They claimed that most people do not witness the agonizing repercussions of overcoming these bodily and emotional scars.
The family stated that they are concentrating on optimism and hope, but that these feelings are part of an ongoing struggle.
“We want people to know the unfiltered truth of his/our new world,”
Cooper’s twin brother, Luke, and his mother, Keely, were also injured in the carnage that resulted in seven deaths and over forty injuries.
Luke was also hospitalized for shrapnel wounds to his lower torso, but he was released after doctors removed a portion of the debris but were unable to remove all of it.
Keely sustained bullet wounds to her legs and feet, necessitating at least two surgery. According to her relatives, she was so distressed by Cooper’s situation that she insisted on being freed from the hospital against the doctors’ advice so she could be with her son at the children’s hospital. Crimo pleaded not guilty to 117 counts, including 21 counts of first-degree murder, 48 counts of attempted murder, and 48 counts of aggravated violence, in an Illinois court earlier this month.
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Despite his plea, according to prosecutors, Crimo admitted to the shooting after police apprehended him hours after the massacre at the parade.
Police say Crimo is accused of using a rifle’similar to an AR-15′ to fire more than 70 shots from atop a business building into the parade audience in Highland Park, a 30,000-person upscale suburb on the Lake Michigan shore.
It was later believed that Crimo disguised himself as a woman in order to carry out the deadly Independence Day attack and was able to escape in the crowd as a result.
Longtime Highland Park obstetrician Dr. David Baum attended the parade with his wife and children to witness his two-year-old grandson march. When bullets were fired and others fled, he ran into the melee to assist the victims.
Baum recalled seeing patients with ‘wartime’ and ‘unspeakable’ injuries in a post-attack interview.