Vijayawada: Thirty seconds! It was during that half-minute time gap that fate played a cruel joke on Kandepi Prudhvi Raj. The Andhra boy, who was killed in the mindless shooting by a gunman in downtown Cincinnati, Ohio, on Thursday, could have been alive and smiling today had the Cincinnati police reached the shooting site 30 seconds earlier.The cops released a video footage of the shooting incident on Friday, in which the 29-year-old gunman, Omar Enrique Santa Perez, is seen firing the last three bullets from his gun before he was shot dead by the police seconds later. One of those bullets killed Prudhvi.Vasu Devineni, coordinator of Telugu Association of North America (TANA), told TOI that Prudhvi, who was working as a financial consultant at Fifth Third Bank, was the last one to be shot by Perez before he was gunned down. Cincinnati police chief Eliot Isaac was quoted as saying that had the police reached the spot seconds earlier, all four lives, including Prudhvi’s, could have been saved.Prudhvi’s friends flew down to Cincinnati immediately after coming to know about the tragedy. He was part of a group of six friends who, after completing their course at Vellore Institute of Technology in Chennai, went to USA to pursue higher studies. They were all buddies in California University as well and settled in various cities after completing their masters.Ajay Mallina, one of his friends, said Prudhvi was the ‘go to man’ for all of us. “He loved travelling, and was a great organiser. He was the one who used to plan our get-together meetings. We all had last visited Shenandoah, and were planning for another trip. Alas, that will never happen now,” he said.Yaswant Yeddulapalli, another friend, said Prudhvi worked really hard to reach where he was. “His parents and younger sister were everything for him. He was a cool-headed, fun-loving guy with big dreams which were shattered by a mindless act of gun violence by an unknown person,” he said.Venkat Poolla, another friend, said, “Prudhvi wanted to do everything right and was very particular about his time sense. He would always reach the bank sharp at 9 am and would always be among the last to leave. Had he left a few minutes early that day, perhaps he would have been alive today.”Devineni, who has been coordinating with Hamilton county coroner Lakshmi Kode Sammarco to complete the formalities, said the mortal remains are being sent to New Jersey to a Hindu funeral home. “Lakshmi Kode, who too hails from Andhra Pradesh, was so helpful in completing the paper work and formalities and the New York consulate has agreed to clear the papers on Sunday. So we hope we can ship the mortal remains to Vijayawada on Monday,” Devineni said. Prasad Koneru, Srihari, Venkat Reddy and Suresh Kakarla from TANA worked round the clock to get things done, he added.Back in Tenali, Prudhvi’s parents are still in deep shock, while his younger sister has been crying inconsolably. Chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu on Saturday condoled the death of Prudhvi and told officials to coordinate with US officials to bring the mortal remains to India as soon as possible.

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