Sixteen year old girl talking with friends on boardwalk one minute, shot dead the next

Here is another story from the New York Post on the shooting death of Tysha Jones

Neighborhood reels in wake of death after teen gunned down at Brooklyn beach

Weeping, grief-stricken mourners today are pouring into the Harlem home of a vivacious 16-year-old girl gunned down in a senseless bloodbath at a Brooklyn beach where thousands of kids had gathered to enjoy a hot and sunny day off from school.

High schooler Tysha Jones had been frolicking at Brighton Beach and joking and laughing with friends on the boardwalk when she was caught in a senseless hailstorm of bullets fired into the youthful crowd around 5:20 p.m. yesterday.

She died later at Coney Island Hospital.

“I just can’t believe my baby is gone,” said a weeping Cynthia Jones, Tysha’s mom, outside the family’s Harlem apartment building.

Today, police are still interviewing witnesses to the chaotic events on a 95-degree day where kids off for the citywide Brooklyn-Queens Day holiday flocked to beaches.

There’s still been no arrests.

Ray Kelly showed up at crime scene today to “take the temperature of people who live here and use this beach on a regular basis.”

“You’re never going to have enough [cops],” he told The Post.

VIDEO: RAY KELLY SPEAKS AT THE SCENE

BLOOD ON THE BOARDWALK

VIDEO: TEEN KILLED, 4 HURT IN BROOKLYN SHOOTING

Four other young men were hurt in the rain of bullets; three are at Lutheran Hospital with gunshot wounds that are not life-threatening. A fourth youth remains in critical condition at Coney Island Hospital.

“She was a good girl—just a regular teenager going to school,” moaned Gus Ingram, 39, one of dozens of family friends visiting the family in their fourth-floor apartment on Lexington Avenue.

Outside the six-story apartment building, a makeshift memorial to Tysha continues to growing with heartbreaking messages and tokens of love to a youngster known for her smile and love of life.

“She was very outgoing and fun-loving,” said Audrey Johnson, a lifelong friend of mom Cynthia Jones. “Her sister just had a baby—she was a great aunt.

“I saw her picture in The Post, and I cried. I have a hole in my heart right now.

“She loved to dance, she loved school and she loved her niece.”

The whole neighborhood appeared touched by the loss of the teen.

Her memorial was crowded with teddy bears, flowers, stuffed dogs, candles and condolences.

“Tysha I love you and I’m going to miss you. Watch over me! Love, Jeanita” one cardboard message read.

Another stated: “RIP Tysha. Gone but neva 4gotten.”

Johnson said Tysha was just an innocent bystander who got caught in the meanness of an unknown and reckless dispute.

“She went out there to have a good time,” Johnson said. “For her not to come back is sad. She didn’t deserve this.”

This afternoon, crowds were beginning to return to Brighton Beach after cops cleared the crime scene around 12:30. It is expected that a large number of students may cut classes on the traditional senior skip day.

- end of initial entry -

June 12

James P. writes:

The New York Post story says,

Weeping, grief-stricken mourners today are pouring into the Harlem home of a vivacious 16-year-old girl gunned down in a senseless bloodbath at a Brooklyn beach where thousands of kids had gathered to enjoy a hot and sunny day off from school.

“Senseless” appears to be another codeword, like “random,” for “black-caused violence.” Once you know that the shooting resulted from black gang members squaring off against each other, it is easy to make sense of the bloodbath. The shooter wasn’t exactly a rampaging homicidal psychopath whose victims were chosen for irrational reasons.

Paul K. writes:

I agree with James P. on the way “senseless” is now being used to obfuscate the obvious.

In an article about the recent spate attacks by mobs of young blacks in Chicago, a black columnist for the Chicago Tribune, Dawn Turner Trice, writes:

There’s nothing about being black that makes a person inherently predatory. The same is true of being a young black male. It’s too bad that young black men have become the poster children for so many of society’s ills.

What happened over the weekend appears to have been vicious crimes of opportunity—totally senseless acts carried out by totally senseless people.

First of all, for Trice to decry the fact that young black men have become the “poster children” for so many of society’s ills is like John Dillinger decrying the fact that he had become the poster child for bank robbery.

Beyond that, there’s the inane use of the word “senseless,” which seems to mean, “It would lead us into dangerous territory to make sense of this.” Would Trice describe the bombing of a black church by the Ku Klux Klan as a senseless crime by senseless people? Of course not—it was a delliberate crime by people who targeted a particular group of people whom they hated. It is quite easy to understand the sense of most crime if you are willing to confront the truth.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at June 11, 2011 06:27 PM | Send