Gunfire from a vehicle struck a young man standing on a sidewalk outside his Brooklyn Park home, and his parents say their son’s opportunity to play college football is lost forever.
The shooting occurred on Thursday, May 29, shortly after 12:30 a.m. outside the man’s home in the 6000 block of Garwood Road. The man said he was shot in the abdomen while standing on the sidewalk, according to Brooklyn Park police.
The man said a vehicle stopped and that someone got out and shot him, police said. The vehicle fled, and no arrests have been announced.
The victim is being identified by his parents as 19-year-old Michael Blidi Jr., who was bound this coming football season for Iowa Central Community College in Fort Dodge, Iowa. He just graduated from Milton Hershey School in Hershey, Pa., where he played on both sides of the ball.
“His dream was terminated by a gunshot wound to his spinal cord, leaving him paralyzed from the knee down,” his father, Michael Blidi Sr., wrote on an online fundraising page started to help with expenses related to the shooting.
“Doctors said he’s not going to walk again,” the posting said. “We, as a family, want to get him some extra help to make sure he walks again. We are asking for any donations … to help our son walk again. Michael is a loving child full of life.”
Michael Blidi Jr. has a brother, Philip Blidi, who just signed as a rookie with the NFL’s Tennessee Titans after playing college football at Auburn, then Indiana and Texas Tech before that.
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