Two dogs lounged on separate front porches Thursday morning, watching over the area of Sumner Street where a teenager and three men were shot the evening before.
Signs warned “Beware of Dog,” but the mutts wagged their tails, welcoming a stranger who paused in a yard where others placed teddy bears, candles and artificial flowers to memorialize Deontae D. Henderson, 24, who died in Wednesday’s gunfire.
Henderson, who lived in West Akron, was the second 24-year-old man shot and killed this month on one of the wide front porches in the 800 block of Sumner Street, a one-block section of Sumner cut off from the rest of the street by Interstate 77, which slices through the neighborhood just north of South Street.
On June 7, Lemichael Stevenson was gunned down on a porch across the street from where Wednesday’s shooting happened.
Detectives investigating that case quickly issued a murder warrant for Malik Shabazz Baldwin, 26, of Fairbanks Place.
Baldwin has not yet been apprehended, court records show.
Gang connection?
Police on Thursday did not speculate on the motives behind the violence on this single block in South Akron.
Akron City Councilwoman Tara Mosley-Samples, who represents the area, said Thursday that neighbors are worried and suspect the gunfire is gang-related.
“I’m starting to believe they may have a point there; having shootings like this so close together is very unusual,” she said.
Mosley-Samples said police have increased patrols in neighborhoods like this where violence is frequent, but said they can only do so much.
“We have a gun problem in this city,” she said. “And right now these young boys with guns have no fear of anything, including police.”
One solution, she said, is giving people convicted of gun crimes more than a “slap on the wrist.”
“We get flak for overpopulating prison with African-American men and there are issues with that,” said Mosley-Samples, who is black. “But when you’re talking gun violence, we’re talking about a genocide on our own race.”
Fighting crime costly
If voters pass the proposed Akron city income tax increase, Mosley-Samples said she would like to see four police substations in neighborhoods so that police could respond more quickly. All officers now work out of police headquarters downtown.
She’d also like the city to consider investing in technology used by the U.S. military to track gunfire in Afghanistan and Iraq. The system, she said, can immediately notify police of gunfire within a 1-mile radius of its sensors. The sensors can also pinpoint the gunfire’s origin to within a few houses or a city block.
“If you know there’s a system in your neighborhood that tracks you when you shoot a gun, you’re going to think twice about shooting,” she said.
Akron Police Lt. Rick Edwards said Wednesday that the department had once investigated such a system years ago, but determined the benefits weren’t worth the cost, which at the time was more than $1 million.
Mosley-Samples said she talked to a manufacturer and prices for a system are now $70,000 to $80,000.
Complex crime scene
On Thursday, police were still sorting out who shot whom in Wednesday’s incident, which they said unfolded like this:
About 9:30 p.m., a 17-year-old male walked onto the porch on Sumner and knocked on the door while two other males stood in the yard.
Henderson answered the knock and stepped out onto the porch.
After a brief conversation, bullets began to fly, police said. Henderson was shot. The 17-year-old was shot, too.
Two other men — Willie James Harris, 30, who lived at the house, and Odell May, 23, who lives in Firestone Park — emerged from the same house onto the porch. They were also shot, police said.
Henderson was taken to Summa Akron City Hospital where he died.
The 17-year-old, who lives around the corner from the shooting site, was shot in the abdomen and taken to Akron Children’s Hospital. He is expected to survive, police said.
Acquaintances drove Harris and May to Cleveland Clinic Akron General. Police said one of the men is also expected to survive, but the other was in critical condition. It was unclear who was critically wounded.
Lt. Rick Edward said police were still sorting out how many people fired weapons.
He said they were also trying to identify the males who were standing in the yard when the 17-year-old knocked on the door, setting the shootout in motion.
Amanda Garrett can be reached at 330-996-3725 or agarrett@thebeaconjournal.com.