Memorial for Magruder
published 10:21am Tuesday Jul 22, 2008
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Yesterday, friends, family, and passers-by gathered at a make-shift memorial on the corner of Monticello Avenue and Sixth Street SE to remember slain teen Joshua Magruder. American flags, stuffed animals, written messages, beer bottles, cigars, and figurines adorned a graffiti strewn wall in the area where Magruder was gunned down last Saturday morning.
On Monday, four people were arrested and charged with the murder–Bobby Wayne Gardner Jr., 25 , Trenton Michael Brock, 20, Theodore Calvin Timberlake, 20, and Rachel Turner, 25�€“ were arrested in a motel room on Emmet Street at 8pm Sunday, where they were “holed up,” according to Charlottesville Police Chief Tim Longo.
Today, the memorial was still standing, along with a special framed message from Magruder’s cousin, India Scott (see photo below), who calls him by his nickname “Spanki,” and writes, “I know you wasn’t perfect and all, but no one had a right to take you life…We miss you cuz!! Watch over your baby girl…she love you just like we all do!!”
That Spanky sounds like a class act.
How gangsta!
I remember the memorial for Jane McGowan, killed a few months ago by two fatherless (adult) dirtbags (who happened to be white). It was different than what I’m seeing here.
PVCC might want to consider offering a Crack 101 course that shows aspiring inner city “bitnessmen of tomorrow” how to maintain customer satisfaction through sound business practices—this would almost certainly reduce our violent crime since drugs cause people to rape, rob, steal, burglarize and all the rest of it. Surely some of our rich, white citizens in the Keswick, Ivy or Farmington areas would like to salve their liberal consciences by donating money so that PVCC can “show the way” to these entrepreneurs of tomorrow? A PVCC class on “Basics of Bluntology” could show our beloved “utes” how to buy blunts at gas stations and convenience stores and avoid the surveillance cameras by always wearing a hooded coat that can be pulled down to one’s chin, since wearing sunglasses at two in the morning now makes the store clerks laugh out loud.
slowly but inexorably the gang and drug aspects emerge. some say that prayer is the answer but I will settle for more cameras at Friendship (Felony) Court and the downtown mall.
Yes, bring on the cameras. They are past due.
Camera programs have proven useless in other cities. Like for example the girl who was recently abducted and raped in New York City. It was certainly on the tape, but there was nobody monitoring the cameras for criminal activity at the time of the crime, or so it seems.
See… http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/15/nyregion/15cameras.html
Strange how the cameras/tapes proved how police officers weren’t where they claimed to be, imagine that, cops lied! HaHaHa! But other things allegedly don’t appear on the tape(s).
SOTLR, How about a citizen volunteer group to monitor the cameras? My guess the criminals would hate the idea, and they would also back off if they knew they were being monitored.
I think we need LOTS more cops on the street, what do you think? I read recently where they are rolling in and chasing down anyone who runs away. Then the police turn ‘em upside down and shake ‘em and see what comes out. I applaud their efforts and I pray for their safety and I am genuinely sorry if the decent folks amongst them suffer suspicion (I suspect even many undeserving ones already suffer our scorn), but it’s got to make everyone safer in the end. Is it possible to rout the transient bad guys who are instigating this? What’s it about? power, drugs, money, anger at the establishment, all of the above? Brain damage, bad parenting, what?
Charlottesville’s got a lot going for it, but if a couple of tourists go down, there will be hell to pay.
I just read the NYTimes article you linked. 220 cameras feeding 30 monitors in that complex alone!
Obviously these housing projects were a bad idea.
I’ve lived in the UK and currently live overseas in a country considering implementing more cameras. I hope you don’t accept CCTV cameras in Cville. They do nothing to reduce crime. They do however instill a sense of Big Brother in a community, and in my opinion they tip the scales for a lot of youngsters to start acting out (think of how YOU would have reacted to having cameras watch you all of the time when you were 15).
In the UK, cameras have inevitably come to replace officers - if my inlaws have someone break into their home at 10pm, there is no one at the police station in their area. That is no joke. They have to call a station that is at least 20 minutes away. Criminals know this and home break-ins are common. It has been proven that speed-cameras and CCTV cameras do not equate to safety (speed cameras in fact do the opposite).
And to those of you who say, “I’m a law-abiding citizen, what do I have to worry about?” I say, this is just the beginning of your loss of liberty.
I think it’s telling that there is no tribute or memorial posted here.