Baltimore Community Members Demand End To Gun Violence, Homicides
BALTIMORE (WJZ) - A woman who's trying to help mothers whose children have been murdered in Baltimore issued a heartfelt and emotional call alongside some of them Saturday for the killings to stop.
"Enough is enough. We have too much bloodshed in our streets," said Millie Brown, the founder of A Mother's Cry. "This has got to stop. This is nothing political. This is about these mothers losing their babies senselessly."
Brown and these women want those who are taking the lives of others to think of how the shootings hurt so many more than those who involved.
"You can stop this. You can end this. Your mother or your grandmother could be putting up one of these orange ribbons, which represents a child that's been taken away here in the city of Baltimore," she said.
Later in the day, a new effort to try to curb some of the violence by bringing neighbors together with music.
Safe Streets Brooklyn is hosting live jazz concerts throughout the summer to get community members better connected, which they said could help reduce some of the violence.
"It's easier to hurt each other when you have no connection to one another and we lost that connection," said a man attending the concert.
The reopening of pools Saturday also could help stop some of the killings, Mayor Brandon Scott said.
"We know that rec centers and our rec opportunities save lives, right?" he said. "Now that we're having 14 pools open for this year and for them to be free, that means young people - children of all ages, especially our teenagers - will be able to go out and swim and do something safe."
Police said 141 people have been killed this year in Baltimore, compared to 134 from this time last year.
