Jennifer Hudson endured more heartbreak Monday when she identified the body of her 7-year-old nephew - found shot to death in an SUV - at the Chicago city morgue. The Oscar-winning actress and singer, who grew up in the Windy City, journeyed to the coroner’s office, where the body of little Julian King lay on a gurney covered with a white sheet. “Yes, that is him,” Hudson said quietly when she saw the boy’s face on a video screen, said Sean Howard, a spokesman for the Cook County medical examiner’s office. For Hudson, whose mother and brother were found slain Friday, it brought the devastating death toll in her family to three. Still, she did not buckle under the grief: “She was just brilliant and strong,” Howard said. “Her last words to me were, ‘Just tell the general public once again to respect my family’s privacy.’”Hudson said her faith in Jesus Christ “was going to get her through that,” Howard said. “Those were her words.”As she left the facility, Hudson’s bodyguards held umbrellas to hide her anguish. Nobody has been charged with the murders, but cops are holding William (Flex) Balfour, 27, the estranged husband of Hudson’s sister Julia, at a state prison for a parole violation. “We’re following any lead we can get right now,” said city Police Superintendent Jody Weis. The Chicago Sun-Times reported Julian had been shot once in the head and was dressed in basketball shorts and a stained white T-shirt. Julian vanished Friday from his home on the gritty South Side after Hudson’s mom, Darnell Donerson, 57, and brother Jason Hudson, 29, were gunned down.In related news, I recently read a great article in the Chicago Sun-Times by columnist Mary Mitchell that address some of the questions that many have been asking... Check it out below:
I'm a mother and I understand how horrifying it must be to be in this situation.
But if your son is running around with a gun, it is likely he will die by a gun.
A different but more troubling question is being asked about the Hudson murders. It is: "Why was Jennifer's Hudson's mother still living in Englewood?"
My answer is why not?
It is my understanding that Hudson tried to get her to move, and a lot of parents would have moved on up, so to speak, after their offspring made it big.
But why should Darnell Donerson have had to move out of the house she worked for and raised her kids in if she didn't want to?
Why should the neighborhood thugs be able to push out the good and the decent?
Also, there's no guarantee that what happened in Englewood would not have happened elsewhere.
Washington Redskins safety Sean Taylor lived in the upscale Palmetto Bay area of Florida when he was shot and later died from a bullet wound that was inflicted when robbers broke into his home.
Jennifer Hudson, who grew up in the church, knows that "weeping may endure for a night."
Her morning will come again.
I pray that it will soon come for the steadfast families in communities like Englewood where people like Darnell Donerson reflected the love.
Mary Mitchell
-WillyTee
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