North Shore Drug Dealer Colin Nutter was just about to turn his life around when he was gunned down by some drug buyers ....

Photo: Michael Nutter said his son, Colin, “always had a lot of really close friends.” Colin Nutter was killed June 3, and three young men are charged in his death.

Colin Nutter was a young man from the North Shore on the brink of two worlds.

After minor scrapes with the law as a teen, by 20 he had taken some college classes and was eager to return to school. He worked two jobs and had bought his first car, according to his father, Michael Nutter.

"He was right on the verge of making some big changes in his life," the father said Friday during an interview at the family's Highland Park home, the day after his son's funeral.

But police say Colin Nutter was also a small-time pot dealer whose two worlds collided with deadly force. A would-be sale June 3 to three other young North Shore residents was really a setup for robbery and homicide, according to investigators.

Although authorities say the three charged with first-degree murder planned their crime, a law enforcement source familiar with the investigation said Nutter might not have been their first choice as a target.

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