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Toronto Sun
Sunday, March 16, 2008
Hundreds of distraught mourners packed a Lawrence Heights home yesterday, spilling out into the street, as news spread through Toronto's Somalian community that the son of a former soccer star from their homeland had been slain.
Abdikarim Ahmed Abdikarim, 18, known to friends as Kareem, was killed in a barrage of bullets on Amaranth Ct. Friday.
He died in hospital with his parents at his bedside.
The parents were too grief-stricken to talk but a throng of friends and family who surrounded them at their home a few blocks from where their son was killed were quick to praise the teen.
"He was a great kid. He had so much going for him," said family friend Abdi Warsame, adding Kareem had never been in trouble with the law.
Warsame said the murdered boy's father, Ahmed Abdikarim, played professional soccer in Somalia decades ago and remains an icon in the community.
"He was one of the best players ever," said Warsame, who grew up watching him play. "He is to soccer fans in Somalia what Gretzky is to hockey fans here in Canada."
He turned pro in the '60s and everyone knows him by his nickname, Antar.
Today "Antar" drives a taxi in Toronto, Warsame said.
Source: Toronto Sun, Mar 15, 2008