According to The Douglas County Sheriff’s Office four teens have been arrested and charged with murder in connection with the deaths of two fellow teens at a Sweet 16 birthday party in the Atlanta suburb of Douglasville, Georgia, earlier this month.
Kids Killing Kids
Timothy Coleman Jr., 18, of Austell, 17-year-old twins Chance and Chase McDowell, of Douglasville, and Kingston Cottman, 17, have all been arrested and charged with with mass murder, aggravated assault, and aggravated battery in the March 4 killings .
One of the suspects, Chance McDowell, is a senior and offensive lineman on the New Manchester High School football team.
The victims were AJ’anaye Hill, 14, and Samuel Moon, 15, with seven other teens injured.
Was The Shooting Gang Related?
Officials say the murdered teens were not the intended targets of what appears to be a gang related incident, when the four suspects opened fire at the party.
“The folks that were hurt and killed were not the intended target,” Douglas County Sheriff Tim Pounds said at a press conference. “They were innocent bystanders. This case is still very, very active.”
As there are murder charges against all four suspects, they are being held without bond. It is unclear at this point whether any of the suspects have retained legal counsel.
Police say shots were fired at 10:41 p.m. after hosts of the party decided to end the event, because it grew bigger than expected, with more than 100 teens in attendance. Officers also say, the extra uninvited guests might have been smoking marijuana.
This is a case of kids killing kids and it’s horrible. Another mass shooting and more innocent people dead because of the prevalence of and access to guns.
AJ’anaye Hill’s mother, Chanell White, told Fox 5 seeing the suspects appear before the judge was heartbreaking.
“It was heartbreaking. All of them held their heads down, but when they came out they looked at everybody, but when they got up to the podium, they drop their heads,” White said.
Samuel Moon’s uncle Richard La Fleur said it was difficult on multiple levels but called for the death penalty.
“It was hard seeing them on two levels, they are young people, watching them walked through those doors, there was no remorse. It was more like why am I here,” La Fleur said. “Yes, death penalty, not so much an eye for an eye but that is part of the punishment for the crime you committed. You took two innocent lives that day. You took our Samuel without reason, without cause.”
Gun Violence Is An Epidemic
Whenever someone loses a loved one to violence, the need to want the perpetrator of the violence to pay is visceral. Capital punishment is a hot button issue and has been since its inception. But it hasn’t proven to be a deterrent to crime.
The issue is, and remains, guns. This country’s obsession and fascination with the right to own killing machines is an epidemic.
More than 45,000 people are killed annually in the United States due to gun violence. Last year an additional 38,500 people were injured due to guns, according to Gun Violence Archive.
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