Dayshon Smith and Richard Whitaker at Richard’s Eli Whitney graduation; Tuesday Richard became city’s 15th homicide victim in 2021.
Richard Whitaker Jr. watched a gunman shoot his brother dead in the Hill. Tuesday night, he, too, was shot dead on the neighborhood streets.
A gunman hit Whitaker, 21, known as “G Rich” to his friends, at 460 Columbus Ave.
Police received 911and Shotspotter notifications about the shooting at 8:24 p.m. Whitaker was found nearby at 43 Thorn St. and taken to the hospital, where doctors later pronounced him dead.
Whitaker’s brother, boxing champion Dayshon Smith, was shot dead on the streets of the Hill as well, last Aug. 15.
Whitaker was standing next to Dayshon when he was shot, according to several relatives. (The two had the same mother, who predeceased them.)
“He was right there,” Richard’s father, Richard Whitaker Sr., said Wednesday. “It’s heartbreaking. But you’ve got to move on.”
“He was a good friend and father. Many people loved him dearly,” said one shaken close friend after the shooting.
Whitaker studied plumbing at Eli Whitney Technical High School.
He left behind a 2‑year-old daughter.
His aunt, Christine Stewart, described him as a “loving kid” who loved to laugh and to play basketball and “loved his daughter and grandmother very, very much.”
“He was very, very heartbroken when his brother died. That was his father figure; he was only 10 years old when his mother died,” Stewart said.
She said Whitaker was in the process of enrolling in college.
The late Dayshon Smith with his grandmother Shirley Gibson, younger brothers Richard Whitaker Jr. and Xavier Harris, and daughter Ezra Smith.
Whitaker’s homicide occurred six hours after the mayor and law enforcement officials held a press conference announcing the expansion of a regional shooting task force. (Read about that here.) On Saturday a memorial healing garden for families of New Haven fatal gun violence victims opened in West Hills.
Tuesday night’s homicide was the 15th so far this year in New Haven.
In January, Alfreda Youmans, 50, and Jeffrey Dotson, 42, were found dead by the police inside a Winthrop Avenue apartment, Jorge Osorio-Caballero, 32, was shot and killed in Fair Haven, Marquis Winfrey, 31, was shot and killed in Newhallville, and Joseph Vincent Mattei, 28, was shot and killed in the Hill. Someone shot Kevin Jiang, 26, to death in Goatville on Feb. 6. Angel Rodriguez, 21, was shot to death in Fair Haven in mid-February, his body dumped by the Mill River in East Rock. Dwaneia Alexandria Turner, 28, was shot to death in the Hill on March 16 during an argument with two other women.
On March 26, Alessia Mesquita was shot dead in Fair Haven. Then 20-year-old Mariyah Inthirath was killed Saturday, May 15, on Sheffield Avenue and Hopeton Jack was killed near Orchard and George on Tuesday, May 18. On May 19, Tashawn Brown was shot dead across from Edgewood Park. On May 26, 34-year-old Adrian Barwise was shot inside a Sherman Parkway house during an apparent argument over a game, according to police. Miguel Ramos, 37, was shot dead on Springside Avenue on June 6.
A terrible, terrible, loss. To his family, and all his friends, I am sorry for his loss, and the pain, and anger this creates for the rest of your lives. The confusion of the pain, grief, and anger, may be the very worst part. It has to stop somewhere. It should not go on. Please do not surrender to the anger. Find out the who. Who used him. Who is using all the young people to carry their guns, and use them. The police can not stop this. The wealthy don't care. The hardest choices and the solution stands with the young men who are allowing them selves to be used as tools of violence, by people who will profit over these deaths. They should be identified in public, and removed from continuing to give guns to young men, who have been trained to believe this is their lives. It is a trick, a bad trick, and all one has to do is follow the money to see who wants this, and enables it, at every level. The big reason is who profits.