Forest Gate shooting: Mum issues one-year plea to find son's killer

Corey Junior Davis - known as CJ - was shot at close range in a Newham playground in 2017

The mother of a 14-year-old boy who was shot dead in an east London playground said he had been approached by gangs to sell drugs before his death.

Corey Junior Davis, from Forest Gate, was found with gunshot wounds to the head in Newham on 4 September 2017.

His mother Keisha McLeod, 40, renewed her appeal to catch her son's killers on Thursday a year on from his death.

She said Corey was sucked into gang culture and bribed with sweets and drinks from senior gang members.

He died in hospital a day after being shot.

Ms McLeod said: "Every day is a day without my son - it's been a year of getting used to the fact he's not there to look after any more, it's not him who comes first. There is only me."

In the year before Corey's death, Ms McLeod said she had taken him out of school and was educating him at home as she was afraid for his safety and changes in his behaviour.

Keisha McLeod said doctors asked to turn off her son's life support after he was declared brain-dead

"I could see my son being put into situations he didn't know how to handle", she said.

"I had a situation where CJ called me because people had taken him to sell drugs...

"I picked him up, I took him to a secluded area, and I said 'If there's ever a time to trust me, it's now - give me what you've got'.

"I took what he had and his hands were shaking. He was a 13-year-old child at this time."

Ms McLeod believes her son could have been drawn into criminal activity by older gang members offering him something as simple as sweets or drinks.

Scotland Yard has released CCTV of a stolen 2011 Range Rover Sport used by his killers as they fled the shooting scene.

It circled the group in the playground before the gunman left the vehicle, fired at Corey and a 17-year-old, got back inside and left the area at speed, police said.

Ms McLeod has called for anyone with any information to come forward. No arrests have been made over the murder.

The Range Rover used by the killers had been stolen from a road in Balham in August