ROCKFORD — Lavontay Allen was known for his love of basketball, his big smile and the ability to slide the perfect one liner into any conversation.
"He was the one in our group that cracked the jokes and made everyone laugh," said Jamone Blaylock. "He was like my little brother."
Blaylock, 17, and Allen, 15, met at Mt. Zion Church six years ago and were active in the church's youth group. Allen, who was killed Tuesday night in a drive-by shooting, made an impression on his pastor.
"Not too many times can you truly say you've never had a problem with a kid, but I didn't,"Marvin Hightower, the church's senior pastor, said of Allen. "This is really a case of somebody innocent being killed by an act of foolishness."
Allen was shot at about 10:15 p.m. while riding in his mother's car near the intersection ofCentral Avenue and Preston Street. His death is the 26th homicide in Rockford this year, the most in the city since 31 people were killed in 1996.
While details of the shooting have not been confirmed by Rockford police, Allen's mother, Jaton Watts, said she was driving the car at the time of the shooting. Her son was in the backseat, and his cousin, a woman in her mid-20s who declined to be identified, was in the front passenger seat. Watts was shot three times in the leg; her niece was unharmed.
Allen, an Auburn High School student, was pronounced dead at a local hospital shortly after being driven there by his mother.
"I just couldn't save him. I didn't know where the bullets were coming from," Watts said in an interview today. "We heard shooting coming from the back of us, and they pulled up to the side of the car and just kept shooting and shooting.
"I turned around and looked at him to ask if he was OK and he couldn't answer, and that's whenI just grabbed him and I kept trying to get away and they kept shooting."
No arrests have been made in the case. Police have not said how many shots were fi red, butWatts said her son survived long enough to donate organs.
"He's going to be a donor," she said. "He asked me once what that meant on my driver's license and I told him, and he said he wanted to do that."
Watts said she did the best she could to keep her children away from violence, encouraging her son to play basketball and football.
"I caught myself shielding him from that life," she said. "I pushed him toward all sports. It kept him at school until almost 8:30 every night. He still had his (basketball) uniform on when we were in the car."
Basketball, Blaylock said, was going to be their way out of Rockford.
"When I found out (about the shooting) I was really surprised," he said. "He wasn't one of those kids that was out here gang-banging. He just wanted to play basketball and talk to the girls."
While Allen was only a sophomore, he already was interested in one university.
"He said he wanted to go to Duke," Blaylock said. "That's all he wanted to do was play basketball and go to college."
A vigil for Allen will be held at 5 p.m. Friday on the basketball court at Liberty Park where he often played. The park is located off South Central Avenue on the city's west side.
Kayli Plotner: 815-987-1391; kplotner@rrstar.com; @kayplot