14-year-old arrested for fatally shooting grad student, seriously wounding his roommate in Walmart parking lot

CHICAGO - A 14-year-old boy has been arrested for a shooting in a South Side Walmart parking lot that killed a graduate student from India and seriously wounded his roommate earlier this year, a law enforcement source said.

Devasish Nandepu, 23, had been in Chicago less than two weeks when he was gunned down in a robbery on Jan. 22 in the 8400 block of South Holland Avenue. His 22-year-old roommate was struck in the chest, and a third roommate said Monday he still is traumatized by the attack.

"I feel that Chicago is not a very safe place," Lakshman Gogada said. "I lost my friend."

Charges were pending Monday against the boy, according to Chicago police. The Cook County state’s attorney’s office did not immediately respond to questions about the case.

Nandepu and his roommates were all from India and had met only a few weeks earlier, Gogada said. They had taken the bus to run errands and were walking to the Walmart through the parking lot when a stolen Kia Forte pulled up and two people in masks jumped out and demanded the men’s cash and phones, according to Gogada and police.

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One of the robbers opened fire even as the three men tried to hand over their cash— a total of about $6, said Gogada, who grabbed his phone and called 911 while tending to his wounded friends.

"I could see blood coming from (Nandepu’s) mouth and he was losing consciousness, so I kept him awake," said Gogada, who was unhurt.

Nandepu died hours later at Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn. His 22-year-old roommate recovered from his injuries and has returned to India. Nandepu’s family came to the United States to retrieve his body.

Nandepu had enrolled in computer science classes at Governors State University in the south suburbs, and had hoped to one day work for a large Silicon Valley company.

Gogada said he now takes most of his own classes at the Illinois Institute of Technology online, and only leaves his apartment for groceries, and then only after checking an app that alerts him about crime in the neighborhood.

Gogada said he is looking at other graduate programs in other cities. While he was grateful to the Chicago police for their help at the scene, he said he was struck by the fact that no people in the parking lot tried to help him as his friends lay bleeding.

"The police were there very quick, like two minutes," Gogada said. "No one else helped us."