When children are killed in the wee hours outside their homes, the public has a slew of questions and commentary that, at times, places the blame on the victims and their guardians.
What was the kid doing out so late? Where were his or her parents? Did the child have a history of delinquency?
The verbal probing, even at its most accusatory, is at best how we sometimes process and try to make sense of our country’s rampant gun violence. The collective discussions and rightful outrage also serve as a sounding board, leading to sometimes misguided knee-jerk attempts to curb the shootings — when the reality is there are just too many Americans, including children, wielding guns.
Take the case of the Chicago City Council, which in the spring responded to the deadly gunfire downtown by moving up the hours of the seldom-enforced curfews for minors. Just days before, Mayor Lori Lightfoot restricted the hours juveniles could be at Millennium Park without an adult.
Some city residents have welcomed the stricter policies. Others, including some experts on crime, are more skeptical since research has shown that curfews are ineffective in keeping children safe.
They certainly didn’t work for 7-year-old Akeem Briscoe, who was killed last week by a stray bullet that struck him as he washed his hands preparing for dinner at his Humboldt Park home.
Akeem wasn’t out past his bedtime or hanging out with teen troublemakers. He was where a child his age should be, and yet he was a victim of the gun violence that is destroying our country.
To America’s shame, Akeem is far from being the only child whose life was cut short in a presumably safe space by someone who was engaged in a gunfight outside.
Just two years ago in Chicago, Amaria Jones, 13, was shot in the throat while she danced for her mother inside their Austin home, and 10-year-old Lena Nunez’s head was pierced by a bullet that came through her Logan Square apartment.
There’s no scarcity of similar senseless tragedies elsewhere.
Four years ago in Milwaukee, 13-year-old Sandra Parks, who wrote an award-winning essay about her fears about gun violence, was felled by a bullet as she watched television. This past April, 3-year-old Devin Page Jr. was shot to death while he was sleeping at his home in Baton Rouge. A few months later, in June, 11-year-old Saniyah Pugh was killed by a stray bullet during a sleepover in Detroit.
Gun violence is now the leading cause of death of children in the United States, and of the children killed by guns in high-income countries, 91% of these killings take place in the U.S., according to the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. Having a weapon inside the home certainly increases the chance of a gun-related death or injury, but even if there are no firearms on the property, there are no guarantees anyone, even children, won’t die when strangers lurking nearby are itching to pull a trigger.
One-third of stray bullet victims are children and nearly half are girls or women, according to a 2012 study conducted by Dr. Garen Wintemute, director of the University of California Davis’ Violence Prevention Research Program. Of the roughly 40% of the victims who were shot while they were at home, nearly 70% were inside their residences, the study found.
“Victims of stray bullets are essentially ‘collateral damage’ and are usually disconnected from the events that lead to their injury or death,” Wintemute said when the study was released. “They are innocent bystanders who typically have no opportunity to flee or take any other preventive measures.”
Wintemute told us he hasn’t done recent research on stray bullet shootings and isn’t aware of current studies by other experts, which prompts us to call for additional, updated analyses. The more data collected, the greater evidence we have of the problem.
But even without that specific research, the headlines we see daily, and Wintemute’s and his peers’ continuing research on other aspects of gun violence, it is clear that America’s deadly endemic spares no one, no matter the location or circumstance.
Akeem had been mourning his father, who died following heart surgery just days before he was killed.
The reputed gang members who were allegedly exchanging gunfire in an alley outside Akeem’s home weren’t aiming at the little boy, like a mass shooter who wants to mow down whoever gets in the way.
Society tends to say the victims in the latter scenarios were at the wrong place at the wrong time.
What words are left for Akeem and other children, who were robbed of their lives where they ate, played, slept and had a laugh with their loves ones?
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