"Be careful, it looks like there's a gang up at the pool," she said, according to an interview on CNN Headline News. "The very last thing he ever said to me was, 'Mom, I'm fine.' "
Forty-five minutes later, a group of East Side Diamonds members surrounded Christopher as he pedaled his blue-and-white bicycle near the pool, police said.
The group "thought Christopher had said something negative about one or more of them, so they decided to confront him," county Detective Kelly Harding said in Anne Arundel County District Court last week.
Punches flew. Christopher tried to get away, pedaling his bike 30 feet before falling to the ground. He was pronounced dead a short time later at Baltimore Washington Medical Center.
Javel M. George, 16, and another teenager each struck Christopher at least once, police said. George has been charged as an adult with manslaughter, second-degree assault and reckless endangerment, and a 14-year-old has been charged as a juvenile with the same offenses.
George's attorney disputes the account, saying George was only play-fighting.
Several hundred people attended a candlelight vigil for Christopher, and even more attended his funeral.
His family has asked neighborhood youths to refrain from retaliation. But a 22-year-old former gang member was arrested soon after and charged with throwing a Molotov cocktail at the home of someone he mistakenly thought was involved in Christopher's death. No one was hurt in that incident.
Since the beating, police have stepped up patrols in Crofton, mollifying some of the public anger. But for those closest to Christopher, the pain remains.
"He was the light of my life," Jenny Adkins said in a tearful television interview. "He died on our street. In suburbia, where our shutters have to match our doors."
