19-YEAR-OLD RECEIVER TRAGICALLY MURDERED

Damien White, a 19-year-old wide receiver, was shot and killed early Sunday morning in South Los Angeles. White was leaving a party around 1:00 a.m. when he was shot in the head in his car.White was a member of Tim Brewster’s first recruiting class at Minnesota and spent the 2007 season redshirting. White left the Gophers after one season, getting sidetracked academically and enrolled at El Camino College in Torrance, California with hopes of getting his football career restarted.White’s Gopher teammates were shocked and sadden after hearing the news of his death, but vividly remember his laugh and sense of humor. His former high school coach Greg Goodyear remembered White as a leader on and off the field. “He was MVP of the track team. MVP of the football team. He was a great kid.""He was going to be a key guy for us this year,” said El Camino coach John Featherstone, who is having his team dedicate the upcoming season to White. “He was doing all the right things. Unfortunately, for a lot of the inner-city kids coming out of Los Angeles, it’s sometimes not a good situation.""I reiterate so many times to my kids to be very careful, not to stay at parties too late, to be sure you know people in the car, to always be looking around. I always say nothing good happens after 1 a.m. He left a party, wasn’t in a very good area and some guys started shooting him."While police are investigating whether or not the murder was gang related, White’s friends say he was never in a gang. At a candlelight vigil they were still hoping that the public would come forward and help the police."Just step up and give the police any information because he was a good kid and the people who did this need to be brought to justice,” former teammate Brandon Patterson said.