JAKARI PEARSON - 8 yo (8/14) - / Charged: Calvin Mosby and Devaunte Starks - Detroit, MI

Dozens mourn boy, 8, shot in bed: 'It's not OK for children to die'


10:51 PM, July 30, 2014 



Neighbors light candles to celebrate the life of 8-year-old Jakari Pearson
on Wednesday night at the Brewster Homes in Detroit.
/ Kirthmon F. Dozier/Detroit Free Press

Jakari Pearson with his mother, Samona Cochran, in an undated photo. / Family photo
Call with information
Anyone with information about the crime, should contact Crime Stoppers at 800-773-2587 (800-SPEAK UP).




Neighborhood children gather in front of 8-year-old Jakari Pearson's
home in Detroit, where neighbors had placed a number of messages
and stuffed animals on the front steps. One of the signs reads:
'Give our children a chance.'
/ Eric D. Lawrence/Detroit Free Press

As 8-year-old Jakari Pearson slept in his bedroom early Wednesday, several shots rang out, striking his family’s townhome on the eastern edge of Detroit’s Midtown area.

One of the bullets traveled through a wall around 1 a.m., hitting Jakari. He died later at a local hospital.

Now, police are searching for his killer and the community is mourning the loss of a boy they say was an innocent bystander.

About 50 people gathered at the townhome Wednesday night where Jakari was killed. Several people — including many children — lit candles and placed bears and stuffed animals at the makeshift memorial.

Jennifer Teed, Jakari’s teacher at the Detroit Innovation Academy on the city’s west side, said she was floored when she heard what happened. Teed, speaking passionately to the crowd, urged for an end to violence that has afflicted the area.

She showed a few people a video of Jakari from this past school year, dancing and smiling in a classroom with his peers. She cried as she held up Jakari’s favorite ribbons that he would twirl in class.

“When I think about Jakari, I think about a little shy boy,” Teed said with tears in her eyes. “ His spirit was always felt in that room.
He had the most energy. He’s among angels now and bringing light to heaven.”

Teed said she spoke Wednesday with other teachers, who are also devastated.

“It’s not OK for children to die,” she said. “To die so senselessly and for nothing.”

No arrests were immediately made, but Detroit police were speaking with a “person of interest” in the case, Officer Adam Madera said. An autopsy is scheduled for today, Wayne County Medical Examiner’s Office spokeswoman Mary Mazur said.

Late Wednesday, Sgt. Eren Stephens confirmed that police were still actively interviewing individuals. She said police believe Jakari’s home was specifically targeted.

“We know that this was not a random act of violence,” she said.

Bullet holes were visible Wednesday morning in the bricks and a window of an upstairs bedroom in the rear of the townhome in the 600 block of East Street near I-75 and Mack, east of Burns Park.

Next-door neighbor Tenesha Higgins said there were “five or six” very loud booms — something she said is common in the complex.

“I was just laying down to sleep,” said Higgins, 30. “I heard the gunshots. It sounded like it was literally in front of the house. I waited, then I heard screaming and police sirens.”

“I opened the door and the boy was laying in the street,” she said, adding it appeared the mother’s boyfriend was trying to rush him to the hospital.

“He was a good boy,” Higgins said. “He liked to play baseball.”

Neighbor Beatrice Spears, 27, said Jakari would often play with her children, ages 10, 7 and 3.

“It’s just such a tragedy,” Spears said. “I’m not gonna be able to sleep.”

The boy’s family members at a nearby townhome declined to speak with the Free Press. At one point, a man identified as his father charged nearby reporters, yelling as another man pulled him back.

Outside the shooting scene, what appears to be a sheet or pajamas with superheroes on it was left on the townhome’s stoop. Spears brought a stuffed animal and placed it at the top of the steps.

Neighbors and passers-by added to the makeshift memorial with stuffed bears, dogs and other toy animals. Propped on the toys were handwritten cardboard signs that read: “CHILDREN ARE THE FUTURE!” “GIVE OUR CHLDREN A CHANCE” and “UNITED WE STAND … STOP THE VIOLENCE!!!!”

The townhome is in the Brewster Homes neighborhood near the Brewster-Douglass towers, where demolition of the four large, vacant high-rises is under way. It’s the same area where Bilal Berreni, a French street artist, was found murdered last summer.

Neighbors said this is the first time they can remember a child being killed in the neighborhood, but gunshots aren’t unusual.

Spears and others said the area has become less safe since a nearby recreation center has closed.

Andrea Suggs, 63, said she moved from the area two years ago with her son to Sterling Heights because of safety concerns. Suggs said her daughter and grandchildren still live a few doors down from Jakari’s family and she wanted to pay her respects.

“I didn’t know the family well, but whenever I saw him, he was respectful,” Suggs said. “My grandbabies are just devastated. It’s really sad to see another young life snatched.”


http://www.freep.com/article/20140730/NEWS01/307300104/Detroit-boy-shot-killed

2 Charged With Killing Sleeping 8-Year-Old Boy Due In Court

August 13, 2014 10:50 AM

DETROIT (WWJ/AP) – A man and teenager are scheduled to return to court in the death of an 8-year-old boy who was shot while sleeping inside his Detroit home.

A preliminary hearing to determine if the case goes to trial is Wednesday afternoon in 36th District Court for 28-year-old Calvin Mosby and 17-year-old Devaunte Starks.

They’re charged with first-degree murder in the July 30 slaying of Jakari Pearson. Police Jakari was sleeping in his upstairs bedroom when his was struck in the chest by a bullet that penetrated a wall at the Brewster Homes public housing project in the 600 block of East Street, near Mack Ave.and I-75.

Prosecutors have described it as a retaliatory shooting. Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy said Mosby had Jakari’s mother and went to the housing project to threaten her the previous day.

Jakari’s slaying follows the July 1 shooting death of a 2-year-old girl in Inkster, southwest of Detroit. Police in that case have said KaMiya Gross was killed in front of her father as retaliation from an earlier shooting. Two men are charged in her death.

“Nothing is sacred anymore,” Worthy said in a statement. “This is the second such incident in a few weeks in which a young child was allegedly deliberately and callously killed to get back at their parent. It is troubling on multiple levels and illustrates how wildly out of control crime is in Wayne County.”

Mosby and Starks also face attempted murder and firearms charges. Starks has been charged as an adult.

The Brewster Homes are two- and three-bedroom attached townhouses. Jakari and his mother lived in a corner unit, and he often was out in the yards and parking lot playing baseball with friends, neighbors said.

B’atrice Spears, whose son played with Jakari, said she’ll always remember the boy’s smiling face.

“He was a sweetheart. Every time I seen him, he was always smiling. There was never a time he wasn’t smiling,” she said.

Jakari would have been starting fourth grade this fall.

http://detroit.cbslocal.com/2014/08/13/2-charged-with-killing-sleeping-8-year-old-boy-due-in-court/