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For now, the boys will be watching plenty of TV--under house arrest. After two child-psychology experts testified at a six-hour court hearing on Aug. 14 that neither boy was a danger to himself or others, R and E were released but required to wear electronic monitoring bracelets around their ankles. As one neighbor put it, "They're not a threat to society. They're only kids." The judge was less positive. "These boys are charged with murder," he declared, but said Illinois law constrained him to release the minors to the care of their parents. Later that night, as neighbors thronged the street, R. was brought back home to Englewood by his parents. E.'s parents, wary of all the media attention, sent their son to relatives far away from Parnell Avenue.
While the community would mourn the death of any child, the death of Ryan Harris seemed especially tragic because she appeared to possess the drive, grace and smarts to rise far beyond Englewood or even the working-class suburb of Lynwood, where she lived with her parents and five younger siblings. She often acted as a protector and guardian for her four sisters and one brother. "If a note needed to be relayed from home about any of her sisters, she would handle it," says principal Justin Brink of W.C. Reavis Elementary School in Lansing, about 10 miles south of Chicago. Ryan was spending part of the summer with relatives in Englewood and attending a local day camp. "She was a quiet kind of leader," says Brink.
A diligent student, Ryan was also a gifted athlete and aspired to play pro basketball. She didn't hesitate to step in on behalf of others when confronted by bullies. "One time this kid was calling me names, and she stood up for me," recalls nine-year-old Wendell Brown, a former neighbor in Ryan's old apartment complex. "She chased him around the cars in the parking lot. Then she banged him against a car and twisted his arm. The boy was almost crying. He apologized to her and to me." On the football field, where she was often the only girl, she could be just as physical. But, says Wendell's 11-year-old brother Scott, "when she had her nice clothes on, she wouldn't play tackle."
Though both suburban towns where Ryan and her family resided in recent years are predominantly white and working class, the apartment buildings they lived in were occupied primarily by poorer black tenants. Still, the comparatively tranquil environs and well-maintained property are a far cry from gang-ravaged Englewood, where she was spending the summer with her godmother. Ryan, say people familiar with the situation, was comfortable hanging out on Parnell Avenue. Perhaps it can be said she had become too comfortable, too complacent in a neighborhood known for violent crime. The past few months have been particularly brutal in Englewood. In April, a four-year-old girl was sexually assaulted in a housing project. The following month a 21-year-old woman was shot on her front porch by a neighborhood thug. There is also the constant threat of druglord violence. "The bad here outweighs the good," says a cop who works the Englewood beat.