My Brother’s Murder, by Carolina Soto
My brother’s dead. The victim of senseless gun violence.
At 80 years old, Richard was still driving for Uber/Lyft. He lived outside of Memphis, Tennessee. From his point of view, the work seemed easy. Many people traveled to Memphis to see Graceland.
When asked why he wanted to keep driving, Richard said, “I could be sitting home watching the tube or I can watch the world through the windshield, and I make some extra money. “
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My adoration for Richard was infinite. When I was eight and he seventeen, I was in love with him and his jelly roll Presley hair-do. He’d lock himself in his room and loudly sing Jail House Rock. I cried at his wedding because I thought I would grow up and marry him.
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His current wife, Yanni, much younger, still works full-time. Richard would drive for a half day, pick her up from work and go home and make dinner. Richard was an excellent cook. Five stars, in my opinion. They were close despite the age difference. One of them would make coffee and bring a cup to share in bed in the morning. Yanni is full of happiness and love. They intersected in faith. It brought them close and sealed their love and marriage.
The gunman took my brother’s wallet and phone before he took Richard’s car. Richard’s blood was on the seat. The man went to McDonald’s and a drug store to spend $100 on Richard’s credit card.
Sometime around three P.M. on October 30, Richard picked up a fare.
This man had walked into the home of Shunish Bagget and shot her in the head. My brother picked up this man from the Bagget home after the murder. Richard drove ten minutes before being shot in the back of the head and dumped on the street. The gunman took my brother’s wallet and phone before he took Richard’s car. Richard’s blood was on the seat. The man went to McDonald’s and a drug store to spend $100 on Richard’s credit card.
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As a society, we are unable to control the guns in the streets. The most common safeguards are unavailable to us. And now my brother is dead.
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A man whose fingerprints were all over the car and who was seen getting into my brother’s car has been arrested and charged with two counts of first-degree murder
This man also murdered a woman with a young daughter, a girl who will likely never recover from the trauma of losing her mother in such a heartless and violent way. I made the mistake of looking at her Facebook page. I wanted to know more about this girl. I saw only fun pictures with her girlfriends.
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I wanted to know if the shooter was Shunish Baggett’s boyfriend or if it was an incidental relationship. I found no answers. I only found the pain of looking at her daughter and wondering who would care for her, love her, send her to school, and get her help to deal with the murder of her mother.
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Shunish Baggett and Richard Skelskey are statistics. Baggett joins the many women shot and killed by an intimate partner. That’s violence said to be the cause of 50% of the mass shootings in this country. A mass shooting, also called “active shooter incident” as defined by the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), is an event in which one or more individuals are “actively engaged in killing or attempting to kill people in a populated area.”
I made the mistake of looking at her Facebook page. I wanted to know more about this girl. I saw only fun pictures with her girlfriends.
The death of Shunish Baggett led to the death of my brother. Abusers with firearms are five times more likely to kill their female victims. Guns further exacerbate the power and control the dynamic commonly used by abusers to inflict emotional abuse and exert control over their victims.
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These two conversations cannot be finished until we as a society stop hiding from the facts and do something. Gun violence is a direct result of people owning guns. No one is safe from gun violence.
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The leading cause of death among children in the United is now gun violence. Last year the death rate from guns was at the highest it has been in more than 20 years. Heartbreakingly, two-thirds of the shooting of children were homicides. And 2,279 children were murdered in this country over the previous year.
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We avoid conversations about sexism, intimate partner abuse, and murder. Who gets murdered? Who did the killing? Who goes to prison if women dare to protect themselves?
In the U.S., 55% of all homicides are intimate partner related. Most of these are not crimes of passion but well-planned and executed murders. Ironically, when a woman defends herself from intimate partner violence, she is likely to be prosecuted and serve fifty-five years to life.
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As horrendous the crime and how it affected me and my family, I hope my brother’s killer will not be executed. He is sick and comes from a sick society. What I really want is for this person to come to an understanding of the harm that he caused.
My brother had three siblings, five adult children, seven grandchildren, and two great-grandchildren. His wife suffers every day. His former wife calls to check in on us. We are a close family and now our daily chat thread is awash with pain and loss. My sister-in-law calls our brother’s killer Animal Gossett. She wants justice, whatever that means.
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But I believe in redemption. I believe at least in the chance of redemption and that with time it is possible to understand how wrong one’s actions are. I don’t believe that the state has the right to kill.
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I’m still in shock. One thinks this happens to drug dealers or gangsters or people outside the legal system. My brother was a minister, a lover, friend, father. Not someone I ever expected to be swept up in the wanton violence of this country.
I believe in redemption.
I was wrong. Until we do something about it, anyone can suffer a tragedy like this. I wonder why as a nation we are all held hostage to the profits of the gun manufacturers. We need a national change in attitude, both to firearms and to those who own them. We need to rethink our individualism which blinds us to the fact that our views are framed by the social structure. Maybe then we can think about affecting change.
One of “the real women of Orange Is the New Black,” Carolina Soto is one of the founding members of the Re/Creation writing workshop at Restoration Plaza in Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn. Unlike the fictionalized Yoga Jones, Carolina has a long history of work in social justice and advocacy and is a seasoned painter and visual artist. Since beginning her work with Re/Creation, Carolina has increased her confidence and aptitude with both the written and spoken word, composing speeches and essays for her advocacy work and as well as written memoirs. In particular, her essays and memoirs illustrate her vast capacity for empathy in her descriptions of people with whom she shared time inside. She now splits her time between living in New York City and the Dominican Republic.