Maya McFadden Photo
Howard Lewis’s family at Ice The Beef rally in Goffe Street Park.
“You hurt us, in a way that it can’t be explained.”
So declared the daughter of one of New Haven’s latest homicide victims, as 100 people showed up to call for an end to the violence.
The families of recent homicide victims Howard Lewis and Ibrahim Valentino Shareef, Jr. spoke at Goffe Street Park at the event in solidarity with a call for peace and for an end to New Haven street violence.
The Thursday evening gathering was organized by the anti-violence group Ice the Beef. It followed a stretch with 11 shootings and three homicides in 10 days.
Howard Lewis, 40, was killed in front of his children while sitting in a car on Munson Street. Ibrahim Valentino Shareef, Jr., 33, was shot and killed near a Whalley Avenue liquor store between Blake and Hobart.
Lewis’s oldest daughter, Hanaisha Lewis, and her siblings wiped away their tears before taking the microphone before a crowd of nearly 100 community members.
“He did not deserve that, and I don’t care how many people keep saying he had a criminal record. What matters is that he always wanted us together as a family always,” said Lewis’ oldest son.
Hanaisha Lewis, a rising senior at the University of Connecticut, said she had been hoping to celebrate graduation with her father.
The family called for justice and respect for their loving father of 12.
“I just want the killer who did this to know that you hurt us,” said another daughter. “I won’t be able to hear his laugh no more or see him smile.”
Shareef’s uncle Remedy (pictured) called on the mayor and the chief of police to join the community next week in a series of marches demanding solidarity for peace in every New Haven neighborhood.
“We can walk to another community every day until the ignorance changes,” he said.
With the loss of his nephew, Remedy said. he will take on the Lewis family as his own. “This is my new family,” he said. Remedy said Lewis’ kids, nieces, and nephews are now his too. Remedy said he will work with the community to “turn pain into power.”
Remedy also called for neighborhood churches to host services outside of their church buildings and in the community.
Ice the Beef President Chaz Carmon said the organization will host a prayer caravan this weekend with the goal of stopping and praying over every New Haven neighborhood.
Many pointed fingers at the lack of jobs and youth programming in communities causing the violent summer.
Beaver Hills Alder Jill Marks and other speakers demanded that Yale University be a better neighbor to New Haven neighborhoods.
Rev. D’Hati Burgess, uncle of recently murdered 19-year-old Kiana Brown, said he too will support the Lewis family. “Now I’m not standing as a spectator on the outside. I’m unified as one with the hurting family,” he said.
Rev. Steven Cousin (pictured) said he is tired of coming together in times of tragedy. Cousin demanded that the community step up to make change.
“You cannot rely on the government to change our situation. You cannot rely on just a president. You cannot rely just on a governor. You cannot rely just on our mayor. Change has to come from us. We cannot wait for a calvary,” said Cousin.
“Why are we suffering? Why are we hungry? Why we don’t have jobs?” asked the Rev. Boise Kimber, demanding the community be given a seat at the table of neighborhood decisions and solutions to issues like gun violence.
Pastor Kelcy Steele challenged the community to remove “black on black crime” from their vocabulary after learning from Black Lives Matters members about how some people invoke it to distract from discussion on police violence or to blame the victims. “We don’t call it, ‘Polish on Polish crime.’ Or ‘Latino on Latino crime,’” said Steele.
Board of Alders President Tyisha Walker-Myers (pictured) was joined by 12 other alders to also call for change.
Walker-Myers said every year since 2011 she has lost someone she knows to gun violence in New Haven, including her 18-year-old nephew Dashown Myers.
“Let reset. Let’s get together. Let’s change our future,” Walker-Myers said.
This article makes me sorrowful but hopeful. I'm mourning for lives lost, lives changed forever by the violence created by a few lost and misguided souls. But I'm hopeful that the community can come together and march, rally, reach out and lift itself up and demand change from within and demand resources from the leaders of our government. I'm hopeful that the religious leaders and their flocks, the community leaders, the anti violence groups, the social service providers, the social influencers, and other concerned residents will reach out to help heal their community, to make clear that this violence won't be tolerated anymore, that the code of silence will no longer be upheld, that snitching saves lives. I'm hopeful that the community will get involved in engaging with young people who need their caring and support to walk a better path. I'm hopeful that everyone who knows the shooters will encourage them to turn themselves in with the help of a lawyer, a religious leader, a community leader to the authorities. I'm hopeful that everyone who knows the victims will refuse to retaliate and stop perpetuating the cycle of violence that has damaged our community for decades of pain and sorrow. Change is in the community's hands, it is up to us to say "no more."