HOW BOSTON COMMUNITIES COPE WITH GUN VIOLENCE
UPDATE: On July 2, 2015 at 11:08 p.m., Raheem Ramirez was shot and killed in Roxbury. He was 22.
By christabel Frye
A Quest for Change
It had been a long four years for Raheem Ramirez, 22.
After spending so much time away, Ramirez was crushed to find out one of his closest childhood friends had been shot and killed. He knew he had to visit the family and pay his respects.
He entered the Dorchester House gym where his late friend’s older brother, Steve DoSouto, helps run multiple basketball leagues. After initial exchanges of hellos and how-are-yous, DoSouto told Ramirez someone was looking for him.
“Who?” questioned Ramirez, puzzled as to who was trying to talk to him after losing connections with so many people.
“I called him,” DoSouto said. “You’ll know him when you see him.”
A few minutes passed before Tony “Big Time” Robinson-Seymour walked into the gym.
“Big Time! What up?!” Ramirez said as he greeted the man he hadn’t seen since he was arrested at 18.
Big Time paused before realizing who it was. It was his height that did it, not many guys are as tall as Big Time, but both of the Boston natives tower over any crowd at well over six feet tall.
“Raheem! Are you out?” Big Time asked, looking at the man who was released after spending nearly four years in jail for possession of an unlawful firearm and ammunition.
“Yeah,” Ramirez replied.
Big Time turned away from Ramirez and dialed a number, putting his phone to his ear. As it was ringing, Big Time whispered to Ramirez, “I gotta call this in.”
Ramirez knew what this meant. It meant Big Time was officially taking Ramirez under his wing.
After spending so much time away, Ramirez was crushed to find out one of his closest childhood friends had been shot and killed. He knew he had to visit the family and pay his respects.
He entered the Dorchester House gym where his late friend’s older brother, Steve DoSouto, helps run multiple basketball leagues. After initial exchanges of hellos and how-are-yous, DoSouto told Ramirez someone was looking for him.
“Who?” questioned Ramirez, puzzled as to who was trying to talk to him after losing connections with so many people.
“I called him,” DoSouto said. “You’ll know him when you see him.”
A few minutes passed before Tony “Big Time” Robinson-Seymour walked into the gym.
“Big Time! What up?!” Ramirez said as he greeted the man he hadn’t seen since he was arrested at 18.
Big Time paused before realizing who it was. It was his height that did it, not many guys are as tall as Big Time, but both of the Boston natives tower over any crowd at well over six feet tall.
“Raheem! Are you out?” Big Time asked, looking at the man who was released after spending nearly four years in jail for possession of an unlawful firearm and ammunition.
“Yeah,” Ramirez replied.
Big Time turned away from Ramirez and dialed a number, putting his phone to his ear. As it was ringing, Big Time whispered to Ramirez, “I gotta call this in.”
Ramirez knew what this meant. It meant Big Time was officially taking Ramirez under his wing.
Working Towards a Solution
Residents in Roxbury, Mattapan and Dorchester are fed up with gun violence destroying their communities. They are striving to put an end to gun deaths. Several organizations located in these areas are working to take guns off the streets, and to save lives.
In 2014 alone, there were 51 homicides in Boston (not including a stabbing in late July in which no charges were filed). Of these 51 deaths, 38 were the result of gun violence. In Roxbury, Mattapan and Dorchester 35 people were murdered; 27 with a firearm.
This constant threat of gun violence creates fear in these neighborhoods. If someone is shot, it affects everyone around them. Families are apprehensive to let their children stay out. Assailants who go to prison wind up struggling to have a full life once they get out.
In 2014 alone, there were 51 homicides in Boston (not including a stabbing in late July in which no charges were filed). Of these 51 deaths, 38 were the result of gun violence. In Roxbury, Mattapan and Dorchester 35 people were murdered; 27 with a firearm.
This constant threat of gun violence creates fear in these neighborhoods. If someone is shot, it affects everyone around them. Families are apprehensive to let their children stay out. Assailants who go to prison wind up struggling to have a full life once they get out.
Big Time works as a violence interrupter through the Boston Center for Youth and Families. This program was something unthought of until the so-called Boston Miracle.
“In Boston, as in many many places in the United States, in the early 1990s, there was a pretty much unprecedented spike in homicides rates among young black men in inner-city neighborhoods,” said Deb Azrael, Ph.D and associate director of the Harvard Youth Violence Prevention Center through the Harvard T.H Chan School of Public Health. “People have attributed it to crack-cocaine markets, and the increase in drug and gang-related violence that happened around these volatile crack markets.”
According to Azrael, researchers found that sending people into at-risk communities to stop violence at the source, rather than when it’s too late, was the most effective way of attempting to end the problem. After its success in Boston, officials from cities all over the country started implementing the same system. When the crime rates went down, the prospects of the “Boston Miracle” went up.
Big Time’s innate need to nurture fit in perfectly with this structure.
“Growing up, (my mother) was the saint around the projects. That lady,” Big Time sighed and shook his head, remembering when his mother prepared bags and bags of food, too much for just his family to eat. He recalled times where she would travel to the thrift shop and buy whatever she could for other families in the neighborhood. She had her children bring the goods around, door to door, handing out the home-cooked meals and heartfelt gifts to whomever was in need.
“It was instilled in us, [...] that compassionate heart for other people,” he said. “Once I got older and I saw the void of strong black men in my community, of course I wanted to stand up and be one of the strong black men in my community.
“Who’d have known I’d end up right here, right now, still doing the same thing for almost 20 years. I love it. The money’s not good, but [...] I think the payoff is saving a young person’s life, knowing that I made a difference.”
“In Boston, as in many many places in the United States, in the early 1990s, there was a pretty much unprecedented spike in homicides rates among young black men in inner-city neighborhoods,” said Deb Azrael, Ph.D and associate director of the Harvard Youth Violence Prevention Center through the Harvard T.H Chan School of Public Health. “People have attributed it to crack-cocaine markets, and the increase in drug and gang-related violence that happened around these volatile crack markets.”
According to Azrael, researchers found that sending people into at-risk communities to stop violence at the source, rather than when it’s too late, was the most effective way of attempting to end the problem. After its success in Boston, officials from cities all over the country started implementing the same system. When the crime rates went down, the prospects of the “Boston Miracle” went up.
Big Time’s innate need to nurture fit in perfectly with this structure.
“Growing up, (my mother) was the saint around the projects. That lady,” Big Time sighed and shook his head, remembering when his mother prepared bags and bags of food, too much for just his family to eat. He recalled times where she would travel to the thrift shop and buy whatever she could for other families in the neighborhood. She had her children bring the goods around, door to door, handing out the home-cooked meals and heartfelt gifts to whomever was in need.
“It was instilled in us, [...] that compassionate heart for other people,” he said. “Once I got older and I saw the void of strong black men in my community, of course I wanted to stand up and be one of the strong black men in my community.
“Who’d have known I’d end up right here, right now, still doing the same thing for almost 20 years. I love it. The money’s not good, but [...] I think the payoff is saving a young person’s life, knowing that I made a difference.”
The violence interrupters at the Boston Center for Youth and Families tend to work with “proven risk” individuals: people that have been to prison or that are known gang-members, amongst other qualifying factors. For the violence interrupters, being from Boston is how they start down the path of saving people’s lives.
“Our organization is divided into two parts: the street worker program, and the violence interrupters,” said Arthur Kitty, one of Big Time’s colleagues. “You have to be from Boston to deal with the (proven risk individuals). They really respect people that come from where they come from. But I don’t think you have to be from the community to show compassion for another person before they get to that point.” Big Time is “like a big brother to me,” said Ramirez. “He’s always there, consistently. And it’s like, I knew people for years who would never do that, or who have known me my whole life who would never do that.” Since being released from prison, Ramirez has been working to get his life back on a positive track. He has a part-time job at Foot Locker, and has been actively interviewing for a construction position through a new program called Operation Exit that has been developed by Mayor Marty Walsh and targets "at risk players" like Ramirez. This is largely in thanks to Big Time and his bigger-than-life connections. Ramirez has plans for his future. He wants to get a car, his own apartment, and eventually go to college. Getting into trouble isn’t one of them. According to Ramirez, the worst part of going back to jail could be facing Big Time. “I know he’d be upset, and he’d tell you, too. And that would be the most embarrassing part. [But] no matter what, I don’t think that he would ever give up. “But I’m not thinking about any of that,” he said with determination. |
In times of Sorrow, The community Stands Together
Alex DoSouto hobbled up to Big Time, wearing a tracking ankle bracelet while nursing a healing gun shot wound in his leg.
“Hey, you’re a street worker, right?” he said as he looked up at Big Time. “They said I could stay out longer if I get help to get me from A to B, to play basketball.”
“Yeah, I got you,” Big Time responded, not knowing that their bond would become one of his strongest yet. That's how Big Time remembers it.
“This kid was special because I could see the potential in him, and he wanted to further his education which was key for me,” Big Time reflected. “I fell in love with the kid. I told him ‘you stick with me, you’re gonna be famous.’ We made the front page of the Globe, me and him. I got him back into English High, where he made co-captain. Got him into RCC [Roxbury Community College] where he became a star basketball player. This was a kid they said was never gonna be about anything but gang-banging. Changed his life around.”
On Thursday, January 8, Alex was killed in a shooting at the age of 24.
“He just got murdered. He was just sitting in his car on H block,” Big Time said. “Wow, that brought me back. I don’t forget it but when you touch upon it, it’s like...wow. He’s a huge success story, but they just caught up to him.”
“Hey, you’re a street worker, right?” he said as he looked up at Big Time. “They said I could stay out longer if I get help to get me from A to B, to play basketball.”
“Yeah, I got you,” Big Time responded, not knowing that their bond would become one of his strongest yet. That's how Big Time remembers it.
“This kid was special because I could see the potential in him, and he wanted to further his education which was key for me,” Big Time reflected. “I fell in love with the kid. I told him ‘you stick with me, you’re gonna be famous.’ We made the front page of the Globe, me and him. I got him back into English High, where he made co-captain. Got him into RCC [Roxbury Community College] where he became a star basketball player. This was a kid they said was never gonna be about anything but gang-banging. Changed his life around.”
On Thursday, January 8, Alex was killed in a shooting at the age of 24.
“He just got murdered. He was just sitting in his car on H block,” Big Time said. “Wow, that brought me back. I don’t forget it but when you touch upon it, it’s like...wow. He’s a huge success story, but they just caught up to him.”
Seeking Redemption
After a shooting, the first question from the public tends to be “who is the victim?”
Then, “Who is the shooter?”
Operation LIPSTICK, or Ladies Involved in Putting a Stop To Inner-City Killings, takes it to next step, asking the question, “Where did the gun come from?”
Leaders of Citizens for Safety, which created Operation LIPSTICK, discovered years ago a little-known fact: many of the guns used in urban crimes can be traced back to women.
“We ask, ‘Where did the gun come from?’ after every shooting to expand awareness beyond the shooter to the criminal transaction that put the gun in the wrong hands to begin with,” said Executive Director Nancy Robinson. “Mobilizing people to ask this question will change customs, practices and laws that flood our streets with crime guns.”
Operation LIPSTICK seeks to change attitudes among women who are sometimes unwittingly exploited by friends and significant others to buy or hold a firearm for them. Citizens for Safety developed the program in 2012 after a study published in the 2010 Journal of Urban Health revealed that women figure disproportionately among straw purchasers — those who buy a gun for someone legally prohibited from owning one.
Then, “Who is the shooter?”
Operation LIPSTICK, or Ladies Involved in Putting a Stop To Inner-City Killings, takes it to next step, asking the question, “Where did the gun come from?”
Leaders of Citizens for Safety, which created Operation LIPSTICK, discovered years ago a little-known fact: many of the guns used in urban crimes can be traced back to women.
“We ask, ‘Where did the gun come from?’ after every shooting to expand awareness beyond the shooter to the criminal transaction that put the gun in the wrong hands to begin with,” said Executive Director Nancy Robinson. “Mobilizing people to ask this question will change customs, practices and laws that flood our streets with crime guns.”
Operation LIPSTICK seeks to change attitudes among women who are sometimes unwittingly exploited by friends and significant others to buy or hold a firearm for them. Citizens for Safety developed the program in 2012 after a study published in the 2010 Journal of Urban Health revealed that women figure disproportionately among straw purchasers — those who buy a gun for someone legally prohibited from owning one.
We ask ‘Where did the gun come from?’ after every shooting to expand awareness beyond the shooter to the criminal transaction that put the gun in the wrong hands to begin with.
- Nancy Robinson, executive director of Citizens for Safety.
LIPSTICK takes a multi-pronged approach to taking women out of that equation and, thus, reducing the number of firearms in urban areas most affected by gun violence.
The organization’s trained facilitators hold public workshops and presentations so women understand the devastating affects that straw purchases have on their communities. They educate the public about the dangers of purchasing, holding, or hiding a gun for someone else. The facilitators include women who have been duped by a man to buy a gun for them. Some of them joined the organization because a friend or family member was shot to death.
Leaders take LIPSTICK’s message directly to community centers, women’s shelters, schools, churches, and anywhere in Boston where they can reach women — including nail and beauty salons.
The organization’s trained facilitators hold public workshops and presentations so women understand the devastating affects that straw purchases have on their communities. They educate the public about the dangers of purchasing, holding, or hiding a gun for someone else. The facilitators include women who have been duped by a man to buy a gun for them. Some of them joined the organization because a friend or family member was shot to death.
Leaders take LIPSTICK’s message directly to community centers, women’s shelters, schools, churches, and anywhere in Boston where they can reach women — including nail and beauty salons.
LIPSTICK offers leadership trainings to empower women to be a part of the solution and asks each person in attendance to sign a pledge that they will not purchase, hold, or hide a gun for someone else. In the past year alone, LIPSTICK leaders have collected more than 3,000 pledges in Boston.
“We give community residents the understanding, knowledge, tools, peer support, and opportunities to help them get involved and carry LIPSTICK’s message to their friends, family, the media, policymakers, health care professionals, and the broader community,” said Robinson. “Women come back to our workshops, leadership trainings and events, and bring their daughters, sisters, and granddaughters, because they know these conversations aren’t happening anywhere else and they’re vitally important to the safety of their families and neighbors. We’ve had girls from age 6 up to grandmothers in their 80s attend our events because women’s exploitation and violence impacts everyone.”
LIPSTICK also launched the country’s first mass transit public awareness campaign in 2012 to warn women of the consequences of crime gun trafficking. Those efforts have paid off. Earlier this year, the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office tallied the number of women and men prosecuted for illegal gun possession in 2011 — a year before Operation LIPSTICK began — and in 2013. In 2011, 52 women were prosecuted for illegal firearm and ammunition possession. In 2013, that number dropped to 36.
“We give community residents the understanding, knowledge, tools, peer support, and opportunities to help them get involved and carry LIPSTICK’s message to their friends, family, the media, policymakers, health care professionals, and the broader community,” said Robinson. “Women come back to our workshops, leadership trainings and events, and bring their daughters, sisters, and granddaughters, because they know these conversations aren’t happening anywhere else and they’re vitally important to the safety of their families and neighbors. We’ve had girls from age 6 up to grandmothers in their 80s attend our events because women’s exploitation and violence impacts everyone.”
LIPSTICK also launched the country’s first mass transit public awareness campaign in 2012 to warn women of the consequences of crime gun trafficking. Those efforts have paid off. Earlier this year, the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office tallied the number of women and men prosecuted for illegal gun possession in 2011 — a year before Operation LIPSTICK began — and in 2013. In 2011, 52 women were prosecuted for illegal firearm and ammunition possession. In 2013, that number dropped to 36.
Women's exploitation and violence impacts everyone.
- Nancy Robinson, executive director of Citizens for Safety
“From what I’ve seen in the community, I believe Operation LIPSTICK played a significant role in this decline,” District Attorney Daniel F. Conley said in a press release. “That is a success by any measure.”
For the Rev. Kim Odom, the field director of LIPSTICK and pastor of True Vine Church in Dorchester, educating people is key.
“We cannot dismiss the ways in which these guns are being trafficked into inner-cities. It’s a public health concern that we need to address,” said Odom. “LIPSTICK is a prevention program. If our message can get to those women and girls to be a part of stopping the flow of those guns that end up in the hands of juveniles and felons and folks who are deemed mentally ill, then you know that’s what we need to be doing.”
Odom is the proud mother of five, grandmother to three, and works with her husband Ronald, who is also a pastor at True Vine Church, which they established in 2006. But she is no stranger to gun violence.
For the Rev. Kim Odom, the field director of LIPSTICK and pastor of True Vine Church in Dorchester, educating people is key.
“We cannot dismiss the ways in which these guns are being trafficked into inner-cities. It’s a public health concern that we need to address,” said Odom. “LIPSTICK is a prevention program. If our message can get to those women and girls to be a part of stopping the flow of those guns that end up in the hands of juveniles and felons and folks who are deemed mentally ill, then you know that’s what we need to be doing.”
Odom is the proud mother of five, grandmother to three, and works with her husband Ronald, who is also a pastor at True Vine Church, which they established in 2006. But she is no stranger to gun violence.
On Oct. 4, 2007, her world came to a crashing halt when her youngest child, Steven P. Odom, was murdered not far from their Dorchester home. He was walking home, basketball in hand, after playing with friends when he was shot and killed. He was 13 years old.
“Steven was very jovial,” Odom recalled with a smile. “He was a big kid, big for his age, he loved family. He loved community. My husband and I are ministers, and we pastor a church, and Steven was our church drummer. He started banging on the tables at 2 years old, and that banging turned into him being a very gifted percussionist.”
A few months after Steven’s death, in early 2008, Odom was asked to speak at her late son’s school as part of a Martin Luther King, Jr. Day celebration, “Buddy Up for Peace.” Odom agreed.
As the still-mourning mother was leaving the stage at the James P. Timilty Middle School, she was approached by one of Steven’s former teachers.
“Mrs. Odom,” the teacher said, “the janitor found journals in Steven’s locker. We thought you might want them.”
The teacher walked Odom to the principal’s office, and they picked up the journals together. Odom was unaware that one of these journals would prove to be almost prophetic.
Page after page of Steven’s peace journal was filled with poems and essays about who he was, where he came from, and what he thought of peace.
“Steven was very jovial,” Odom recalled with a smile. “He was a big kid, big for his age, he loved family. He loved community. My husband and I are ministers, and we pastor a church, and Steven was our church drummer. He started banging on the tables at 2 years old, and that banging turned into him being a very gifted percussionist.”
A few months after Steven’s death, in early 2008, Odom was asked to speak at her late son’s school as part of a Martin Luther King, Jr. Day celebration, “Buddy Up for Peace.” Odom agreed.
As the still-mourning mother was leaving the stage at the James P. Timilty Middle School, she was approached by one of Steven’s former teachers.
“Mrs. Odom,” the teacher said, “the janitor found journals in Steven’s locker. We thought you might want them.”
The teacher walked Odom to the principal’s office, and they picked up the journals together. Odom was unaware that one of these journals would prove to be almost prophetic.
Page after page of Steven’s peace journal was filled with poems and essays about who he was, where he came from, and what he thought of peace.
“That journal has been a saving grace in a sense,” Odom explained. “It’s hard sometimes, when I see the young people in the neighborhood. Everyone’s grown up, and it’s hard not to wonder what Steven would be doing. I believe that he’s looking down from heaven and saying, ‘OK you guys, don’t give up.’ He is definitely a guardian angel.”
Odom takes what her son left her and turns it into energy to help her get through. “I remember saying ‘Steven’s life doesn’t end on the sidewalk for me, and his death will not be in vain.’ When I said it I didn’t quite know, specifically what I meant but I knew that I couldn’t just say ‘Oh, well, this is what’s happening in our community’ and just move on. I knew I couldn’t do that. So, I appreciate that there were these places, these other community folks that were providing or creating opportunities for a survivor like me who was on a quest to be a part of making a difference in the community.”
Every year, the family walks down the street from their home to the spot where Steven was shot. They stand by the tree that former Mayor Thomas Menino helped the family plant in Steven’s memory. This past Oct. 4, on the seventh anniversary of his death, Odom, her husband, and the rest of their family walked to the tree, wondering if they were the only ones who had remembered.
When they got there, they got their answer.
Seven glass candles had been lit, placed in the form of the number seven, near the tree by Steven's childhood friends. A true reminder that while Steven is gone, he is never forgotten.
Odom takes what her son left her and turns it into energy to help her get through. “I remember saying ‘Steven’s life doesn’t end on the sidewalk for me, and his death will not be in vain.’ When I said it I didn’t quite know, specifically what I meant but I knew that I couldn’t just say ‘Oh, well, this is what’s happening in our community’ and just move on. I knew I couldn’t do that. So, I appreciate that there were these places, these other community folks that were providing or creating opportunities for a survivor like me who was on a quest to be a part of making a difference in the community.”
Every year, the family walks down the street from their home to the spot where Steven was shot. They stand by the tree that former Mayor Thomas Menino helped the family plant in Steven’s memory. This past Oct. 4, on the seventh anniversary of his death, Odom, her husband, and the rest of their family walked to the tree, wondering if they were the only ones who had remembered.
When they got there, they got their answer.
Seven glass candles had been lit, placed in the form of the number seven, near the tree by Steven's childhood friends. A true reminder that while Steven is gone, he is never forgotten.