SALT LAKE CITY — Even though friends say 16-year-old Maile Fine was getting out of gang life, it was still gangs that brought him down.
The Horizonte High School student was playing Russian roulette at a friend's apartment near 1200 S. Emery (1170 West) after school Thursday when the gun, which friends said they saw him unload, fired a bullet into his head.
"It shocked us," said Kaisa Kinikini, whose nephew was nearby when the revolver was fired. "Little Maile, he was a good kid."
Kinikini's wife, Ana, said her nephew and another boy held the high school freshman's head together as he was taken to Intermountain Medical Center in serious condition after the accident happened about 2:16 p.m. Salt Lake police, who said they would not release the teenager's name until Friday, said his condition grew worse at the hospital and he later died.
Salt Lake Police Lt. Scott White said people can never be too careful with guns.
"We (should) treat all guns like they're loaded," he said.
Friends and family called Thursday's incident a tragedy and said Fine, like many other teenagers in the Glendale area, had been pressured to join gangs.
Kaisa Kinkini said Fine had been spending time with Kinikini's nephew to focus on music and stay out of gangs. The boys had been waiting to record hiphop and reggae music in a small studio in the basement of the apartment when the shooting occurred.
"This kid, people had been trying to recruit him into gangs," Kaisa Kinikini said. "He's been coming around here since October, since my nephew got off his mission."
Friends say Fine used to go to the same ward in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints but was having family problems since his parents divorced and he "started hanging with the wrong crowd."
But for the past several months, Fine had been surrounded by a support system of friends. Somehow, he still had access to a gun, which friends and family believe was a result of gang pressure.
"It shocked the heck out of us that he brought a gun into the house," Kaisa Kinikini said. "Dang, it tells you what the gangs are trying to do."
Kaisa Kinikini, who heads the anti-gang program Stand A Little Taller, also known as SALT, in Salt Lake City, said more needs to be done to keep gang pressure down.
Kaisa Kinikini and Richard Kaufusi, a family friend who is also director of the Opportunity Scholars Program at the University of Utah David Eccles School of Business, said more programs and opportunities need to be made available to kids to give them something to focus on.
"When the kids step out on the street, they're on their own," Kaufusi said. "They feel they need to protect themselves with guns."
Friends at the apartment grieved while removing a bloodied chair and painted the living room wall where blood had splattered to rid it of a constant reminder of their loss.
"It's just a tragedy," Kaisa Kinikini said.
e-mail: lgroves@desnews.com