‘Gave people so much’: Teenage London homicide victim mourned

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Candles burned Monday at a memorial to a London teenager in the parking lot of a public housing complex where the 18-year-old died after allegedly being stabbed Friday night.

People close to Abdul Hashim, known to his friends as “Zeko,” remember the Sir Wilfrid Laurier secondary school graduate as a hard-working teen with “a heart of gold” and big dreams of making a mark in sports and engineering.

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Abdul Jabbar Al-Samraei, 19, is among those mourning the loss of Hashim.  Al-Samraei has been tending to his late friend’s memorial in the parking lot at 1057 Southdale Rd. E., standing up knocked-over flower vases and relighting candles.

Al-Samraei said his friend was “kind-hearted” and he recalled when the two first met as boys at White Oaks Mall. Hashim, he said, was trying to stop a fight.

“It was a couple people trying to fight. I was one of the ones fighting,” Al-Samraei said. “He got between us and stopped everything.”

The last time he saw his friend, a week before his death, Al-Samraei said Hashim was singing along to a tune he’d been playing on repeat. Hashim loved to sing, Al-Samraei said.

Police have charged two 17-year-old males, who can’t be publicly identified under Canada’s youth justice law, with second-degree murder in the teenager’s death.

Hashim died Friday night after he was stabbed in the parking lot of the Southdale housing complex where they lived, just east of Millbank Drive, his grieving father, also named Abdul Hashim, told The Free Press over the weekend.

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Two days before his son died, he graduated from Sir Wilfrid Laurier secondary school, his father said.

The younger Hashim dreamed of going on to post-secondary school and becoming an electrical engineer, his father said.

A few buildings over from the memorial, three women prepared dozens of makeshift candle holders for another memorial ceremony for the teenager planned for Monday evening.

Jennie Parnell, one of the women and close friend of Hashim, described him as a hard worker with “a heart of gold.

“He gave people so much, more even than I realized,” she said, adding that he always tried to make people feel better.

Hashim loved his family and was always checking on his younger siblings, Parnell said, adding the young man also dreamed of bringing his mother to Canada from Bangladesh.

“He was doing so well,” Parnell said of the 18-year-old. “He was a hard worker who put everything into what he was doing.”

A dedicated boxer, Hashim would stay up late into the night practising on a punching bag set up in Parnell’s house, she said.

Before he died, Hashim was training for a tournament at his boxing gym, Parnell said.

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“He was just so dedicated. He loved it.”

Parnell also mentioned Hashim’s love of food and how he was learning to cook. “He was always experimenting,” she said, joking that while his creations didn’t always look so good, they tasted amazing.

“I loved that kid,” Parnell said, choking up. “He will be missed by many, many people.”

At his high school Monday, the flag flew at half-mast in memory of Hashim, the Thames Valley District school board confirmed.

An email sent by school principal Matt Bradacs to parents and students on Sunday said there had been a “sudden student death” and that support services would be available to students. The school board’s traumatic events response team was at the school Monday to provide counseling support to students and staff.

nbrennan@postmedia.com

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