Promising high school football player killed in holdup attempt

DUNDALK, Md. -- A high school football star armed with a pellet gun was fatally shot during an attempted liquor store holdup, police said.

Derrick Lemell Breedlove, 17, who had a football scholarship to attend Virginia's Hampton University in the fall, died Wednesday of two gunshot wounds to the upper chest.

"When I got the call, I thought it must be a mistake, it has to be a mistake," said Kim Stephanic, principal at Dundalk High School outside Baltimore. She said the 6-foot, 2-inch, 251-pound athlete was bright and had a promising future.

"Derrick was supposed to be in his first-period class and instead he was robbing a liquor store," Stephanic said.

Richard Kosinski, 50, the clerk who fatally shot Breedlove, has not been charged, police said. The store was robbed twice last month.

Police said Kosinski, who was in a back room of the liquor store, saw the teen-ager holding up another clerk. He left through a side door and re-entered through the front door, opening fire on Breedlove.

Police charged Ryan Raivel, 17, the suspected getaway driver, with armed robbery and conspiracy, and Ryan Crowe, 17, with armed robbery.

Raivel is a senior at Dundalk; Crowe dropped out of the school. Breedlove also was identified as a suspect in two other armed robberies at the liquor store, police said.