Shootings in Newark

[BlkSpartacus]

2 killed in 5 drive-by shootings in Newark
by Jonathan Schuppe and Angela Stewart/The Star-Ledger Friday October 24, 2008, 8:00 PM

Saed Hindash/The Star-Ledger
A person looks out the back of a police car near Boyd Street and Muhammad Ali Boulevard in Newark as police investigate one of Friday afternoon's shootings.
Four people were shot, two fatally, in five drive-by shootings that took place during a 45-minute wave of violence this afternoon in Newark, police said.

Family members identified one of the dead as Quadir Burroughs, 22, of Newark. The other was identified by her fiance as 24-year-old Angelina Evans, a mother of three.

The shootings began at about 2:15 p.m. at the Seth Boyden housing project, according to Police Director Garry McCarthy, who said the shots came from a white Infiniti sport utility vehicle with two or three males inside. The gunfire did not hit anyone, he said.

Twenty minutes later, at 2:35 p.m. Burroughs was killed as he walked along Ridgewood Avenue after leaving his mother's home to visit a friend. The shots came from the same vehicle, McCarthy said.

Four people shot in Newark drive-by shooting


Five minutes later, police received reports of more shots being fired at Clinton and Chadwick avenues. In that incident, a 27-year-old man was shot in the elbow. Police recovered a number of shell casings at the scene.

Then, at 2:55 p.m., Evans, whose children three children are 2, 5 and 6, was shot and killed at 174 Boyd Ave., not far from the 18th Avenue Elementary School.

Evans' fiance, who asked that his name not be used, said he did not know where she was headed at the time. He the children were not with her when she was shot.

"I'm in disbelief right now," he said. He called Evans "a good mother" who loved singing and helping her children with their school work.

South Ward Councilman Oscar S. James II said he saw the young woman - who had been shot in the stomach - being loaded onto an ambulance at Boyd Avenue.

"My stomach just fell out. I just can't believe it. I felt so bad, so helpless...We need a solution to this violence," James said.

Police "picked up on the car," according to McCarthy, not long after Evans was killed and chased the Infiniti for eight minutes. The pursuit continued onto Route 78, where police lost it. Surrounding municipalities were notified but the suspects remain at large.

During the chase, at 3:04 p.m., police received a 911 call that a 16-year-old boy had been shot on Irvine Turner Boulevard. Taheesha Greene, 37, identified the boy as her son, Hakir, a junior at Central High School. He was listed in critical condition tonight after undergoing surgery, hospital spokesman Jerry Carey said.

McCarthy said police are not sure if the Infiniti was seen at the Irvine Turner Boulevard shooting and are working on the theory that shooting was not related to the others.

More than 90 minutes after the spate of shootings, there were two others reported that police believe were not related the earlier incidents: At 4:41 p.m., a man was shot in the leg on Pacific Street; at 4:53 p.m. a man was shot in the leg on Goodwin Street.

At University Hospital, Burroughs' girlfriend, Nadisha Green stood outside the emergency room, crying. The couple have a 7-year-old son, she said, adding that she is two months pregnant with their second child.

Burroughs was a high school graduate who loved the law and often talked to young boys in the neighborhood about staying out of trouble, said Green, 29.

"He was a young black man who didn't deserve to get killed the way he did," she said.

Hakir Greene was shot near the Queen of Angels School. "He was just a good kid, not involved in any gang," said his mother, a teacher's aide at another school.

An eyewitness to that shooting said he heard several "pops."

"It appeared the kids got out of school. There was a large crowd - a huge commotion," said Jerrah Crowder, director of development for Quest Ink, Inc. who was parking his car at the time. At the sound of the shots, Crowder said, the teens scattered, revealing a young man lying on his back. "He was breathing and conscious," he said.

"Right now, there's a lot of anxiety, a lot of mental anguish," said the Rev. Jethro James, pastor of the Paradise Baptist Church at 15th Avenue and Hunterdon streets, near the site of one of the shootings.

Mayor Cory Booker decried the violence.

"The city as a whole, we are obviously hurting as a result," he said. "There are 30 fewer murders so far, about a 40 percent reduction, but right now we are hurting. We will get to the bottom of this and capture the people responsible for this heinous crime."

Anyone with information can call the Newark Police Department's 24-hour "Crime Stoppers" anonymous tip line at (877) 695-8477 or (877) 695-4867.

Staff writers Kasi Addison, Katie Wang, Maura McDermott, Riginald Roberts, Jeffery C. Mays, Judy Peet and Amy Ellis Nutt contributed to this report.

[BlkSpartacus]

Its a sad day for the city and the surrounding areas. So far the shootings just seemed to be random regardless of what the police say. Word on the street it might be initation for a gang. Regardless, a young sista,mother lost her life and so did a young positive brother. Keep us in your thoughts. Im going to hit my brothers up and see what can be done. Peace Fam

[Fenix]

Whenever I hear something like this it makes me think of how short life really is. The senseless and killing of another human being baffles me to no end.

We have to start teaching our kids to value their lives and perhaps they'll stop mindlessly taking the lives of others.

Gang initiation. That is so terribly sad to me.

Peace to the ones struggling to deal with this.