Arrest made after student from Ghana was shot and killed on way to school in New York City

Detailed summary

Javits Frimpong’s death sparked protests and led Mayor Zohran Mamdani to seek help from President Trump

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A teenager has been arrested for murder after a 15-year-old Ghanaian immigrant was shot and killed on his way to school in New York City.

Javits Frimpong was fatally shot on a Bronx street shortly before 9:30 a.m. on Oct. 29. News of a 17-year-old’s arrest in the case came Wednesday as Javits’ family gathered for a previously planned news conference. The male suspect, who has not been named, is being charged with murder, the New York Police Department said.

“I need justice for my child,” Javits’ mother, Doris Adu Gyamfi, said through tears at the event attended by civil rights lawyer Ben Crump, the Rev. Al Sharpton and Ghana's U.N. ambassador, Samuel Yao Kumah, at Sharpton's National Action Network headquarters.

Javits’ death sparked protests in New York and led Mayor Zohran Mamdani to ask President Donald Trump to arrange a visa for Frimpong's mother to travel to the U.S.

“The murder of a child is a pain no parent should have to endure, let alone from thousands of miles away,” Mamdani wrote on Oct. 31. “Javits Frimpong’s mother deserves to say goodbye to her son in person. I just got off the phone with President Trump and he has agreed to grant her visa immediately.”

The teen’s family previously said he was being bullied at school. Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny said police were looking into bullying as a possible motive, along with robbery. Kenny suggested there were “three perpetrators” involved.

“What we're all wondering is: Why?” Crump said Wednesday as the teen's mother wept on Sharpton's shoulder. “Why did they kill this young man, this person with such a bright future?”

Kumah called the arrest “a step in the right direction” after detailing how Javits’ death shocked Ghanaians.

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