This morning the Seattle Times has a very good article today on the criminal history of Quincy Coleman, the 15 year old kid who was killed last Friday night on the east side of the Garfield campus. I recommend reading the whole thing.
Back during the summer burglary spree we talked about the issues with the county juvenile justice system that was returning repeat offenders back to the streets. Quincy Coleman was one of those kids, and just two months ago prosecutors had recommended that he be locked up due to his participation in one of those burglaries. But the judge disagreed and he was released on probation, only to end up dead a couple of months later:
According to King County court documents, prosecutors in September had recommended the 16-year-old be sentenced to a 52- to 65-week stint in a juvenile-detention home.
But Superior Court Judge Carol A. Schapira instead chose to give the boy — who had a history of residential burglaries, car prowls and drug violations — another chance and suspended the sentence, allowing Coleman to go free.
Said one law-enforcement official familiar with the case who did not want to be named, “He’d be locked up, but he’d be alive.”
And yesterday we mentioned that we had heard his name on the scanner. Unfortunately my handwritten notes are difficult to match up to events we put into the system, so I couldn’t get a complete list of the scanner entries he was connected to. I was fairly sure he was connected to some of the burglaries, and based on information in the Seattle Times story, we can now say that he was. In fact, it appears that he was the kid involved in a particular event we reported on back in July.
And again, nothing these kids are involved in should be a death sentence. No one deserves that. But it is just one more indication that something is deeply broken in the city’s and county’s juvenile justice system. Ignoring the problem and keeping the status quo is killing our neighborhood kids.
It’s short, but its out there: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,446690,00.html
Q was one of the most intensely unique people ever to live, and his death is so wrong for so many reasons. at heart he was truly an amazing person, and a large number of people were touched by his creativity and humor in his lifetime; I will never by any means forget him. it destroys me inside that he is truly gone, and is very difficult to accept. once a destructive cycle is set in motion, it can be impossible to stop.
RIP QUINCY I LOVE YOU FOREVER
Where are Quincy’s parents? I’m sure he was a wonderful boy but just tell me how it gets to this point for him? I live on 25th, right near the shooting and walk by groups of kids holding a vigil at the fatal spot and I feel so sad that any of them are having to experience this. When I was 15, my brother was killed in a street robbery. I was amazed at the amount of judgement his town put upon him for his choices…like he was the bad guy or something! I understand it’s easy to want to blame the kid/victim because he had history of being a trouble maker…but why isn’t a string of crimes comitted AT FIFTEEN YEARS OLD a wakeup call to our judicial system….or his parents?!?!?!?
How can we help? How can we as a community give this more attention and not spend all our energy criticizing the work that others aren’t doing?
Who are the killers? Who the hell would EVER be willing to kill a fifteen year old boy?
On the same note, I have been feeling uncomfortable about how dark 25th is for a long time. Last night on the news, I saw that in Sea Tac a neighborhood had rallied for more streetlights. Less hiding spots, less crime. Although it would be nice to assume that a highschool, community center and family pool would insure a more family oriented neighborhood….it doesn’t. Who do we talk to and how do we rally to get this area better lit? The stairs where Quincy was shot are just asking for trouble.
Anyone else agree?
Sometimes we have to face the facts that teens who get involved with gang violence will become collateral damage .
We ask where are their parents ?
The Parents are either jailed or in the Crack/Meth houses in the CD or Raineir area .
You cannot parent a child with your mind filled with “Smoke” and “Dope” .
You could build a million rec centers,pools and other activities but there is a certain element of youth that wants the “Gangsta” lifestyle .
These youths are not going to attend school and will not seek employment because they are influenced by Hip-Hop and prison culture .
Try to drum change in their heads everyday it does not mean anything to them .
The violence that is going on in the CD will continue until they kill each other off .
The Mayor and Councilman Roth can come up with initiatives but these teens are too far gone to be turned around .
before you haters assume that his parents are crackheads or live in the projects or in jail how about you meet them. i personally have met them many times and they are good parents. fuck erryone tryina talk shit. quincy and his parents are good people so before people assume shit how about you get the facts straight.