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CNN Saturday Morning News
Children Murdered in Detroit on Rise
Aired January 04, 2003 - 07:50 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
HEIDI COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: We turn our attention now to disturbing news out of Detroit. Young children killed and few answers as to why.
CNN's Jeff Flock has the details.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JEFF FLOCK, CNN CORESPONDENT (voice-over): Angine Pollard's (ph) mother takes us back to the scene.
ALIZABETH NIEBRZYDOWSKI, VICTIM'S MOTHER: The car was pulled up to right here.
FLOCK: This scene. Where her young daughter was shot by a man who sprayed their car with gunfire last February.
NIEBRZYDOWSKI: As we heard that I had her coat I had to sleep with her coat just to smell her scent. I don't smell her scent any more.
FLOCK: The stories are heart-wrenching. First, 7-year-old Angine, then 3-year-old Destiny Thomas (ph), shot watching TV in her bedroom when someone fired an AK-47 in her house.
8-year-old Brianna Cadel (ph) killed in her bed by stray fire.
Antwon Belton (ph), 11, hit on his porch when someone shot at his house.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is an AK-47.
FLOCK: By the time 2002 ended, 23 children, aged 16 or under, shot, shaken, strangled, or stabbed to death.
Up 21 percent, one of the worst rates in the nation.
Most, innocent victims in the wrong place at the wrong time.
The odd thing is that overall crime is down in Detroit. Violent crime is down, the overall number of shootings down. And yet there is this spike in killings of the very youngest.
Why?
MAYOR KWAME KILPATRICK, DETROIT, MICHIGAN: Don't know. Can't answer that question with a single sentence. FLOCK: At 32, Kwame Kilpatrick, the youngest mayor in Detroit history, has taken the child killings personally. Cracking down on weapons, targeting abandoned houses and gangs. His police force solved all but three of the child murders. Eight people already in prison. But Kwame says he hasn't done enough.
KILPATRICK: As long as bad things happen I'll wear it on my shoulders and I'll give myself a bad grade for being able to bring people together.
WEUSI OLUSOLA, SHOOTING VICTIM: It'll work out a little bit.
FLOCK: Weusi Olusola was hit four times in gang crossfire in 1986, the worst year for child killings in Detroit, when 43 were murdered. He's been paralyzed ever since.
OLUSOLA: Rather than putting a lot of our energy on what's going on overseas and the war on terror, we really need to be looking more at what's happening in our own backyard.
FLOCK: With Agine Pollard gone not yet a year, this is all her mother has left. Agine's braid and death certificate and her own grief and guilt.
NIEBRZYDOWSKI: I was her mommy; I was supposed to protect her. And I feel like I didn't do it. I didn't.
FLOCK: No one, it seems, has been able to protect Detroit's children. It may take a village to save a child, but only a single to kill one. I'm Jeff Flock, CNN, in Detroit.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired January 4, 2003 - 07:50 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
HEIDI COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: We turn our attention now to disturbing news out of Detroit. Young children killed and few answers as to why.
CNN's Jeff Flock has the details.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JEFF FLOCK, CNN CORESPONDENT (voice-over): Angine Pollard's (ph) mother takes us back to the scene.
ALIZABETH NIEBRZYDOWSKI, VICTIM'S MOTHER: The car was pulled up to right here.
FLOCK: This scene. Where her young daughter was shot by a man who sprayed their car with gunfire last February.
NIEBRZYDOWSKI: As we heard that I had her coat I had to sleep with her coat just to smell her scent. I don't smell her scent any more.
FLOCK: The stories are heart-wrenching. First, 7-year-old Angine, then 3-year-old Destiny Thomas (ph), shot watching TV in her bedroom when someone fired an AK-47 in her house.
8-year-old Brianna Cadel (ph) killed in her bed by stray fire.
Antwon Belton (ph), 11, hit on his porch when someone shot at his house.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is an AK-47.
FLOCK: By the time 2002 ended, 23 children, aged 16 or under, shot, shaken, strangled, or stabbed to death.
Up 21 percent, one of the worst rates in the nation.
Most, innocent victims in the wrong place at the wrong time.
The odd thing is that overall crime is down in Detroit. Violent crime is down, the overall number of shootings down. And yet there is this spike in killings of the very youngest.
Why?
MAYOR KWAME KILPATRICK, DETROIT, MICHIGAN: Don't know. Can't answer that question with a single sentence. FLOCK: At 32, Kwame Kilpatrick, the youngest mayor in Detroit history, has taken the child killings personally. Cracking down on weapons, targeting abandoned houses and gangs. His police force solved all but three of the child murders. Eight people already in prison. But Kwame says he hasn't done enough.
KILPATRICK: As long as bad things happen I'll wear it on my shoulders and I'll give myself a bad grade for being able to bring people together.
WEUSI OLUSOLA, SHOOTING VICTIM: It'll work out a little bit.
FLOCK: Weusi Olusola was hit four times in gang crossfire in 1986, the worst year for child killings in Detroit, when 43 were murdered. He's been paralyzed ever since.
OLUSOLA: Rather than putting a lot of our energy on what's going on overseas and the war on terror, we really need to be looking more at what's happening in our own backyard.
FLOCK: With Agine Pollard gone not yet a year, this is all her mother has left. Agine's braid and death certificate and her own grief and guilt.
NIEBRZYDOWSKI: I was her mommy; I was supposed to protect her. And I feel like I didn't do it. I didn't.
FLOCK: No one, it seems, has been able to protect Detroit's children. It may take a village to save a child, but only a single to kill one. I'm Jeff Flock, CNN, in Detroit.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
