NEW ORLEANS — Since last Saturday 5 different women have fallen victim to gun violence in the City of New Orleans. What’s even more shocking, none of the women are believed to have been the intended target.
It began when” Beast of the Southern Wild” actress Jonshell Alexander was shot in killed in some else’s car.
That same day Monique Blount was slain driving into a shootout happening in her Gentilly neighborhood.
Thursday, the mother of Judge Robin Pitman was also caught by stray gunfire by suspected car burglars who were confronted by residents in Pines Village in New Orleans East.
Friday night, neighbors in the 2300 block of North Galvez say gunfire was going off for nearly two minutes between homes when a woman was caught in the middle of the gunfire and died on the way to the hospital.
A few hours later in Pines Village, the same neighborhood as Judge Pittman’s mother, a woman was shot and later transported to the hospital.
All 5 of the victims are women and none of them was the intended target.
Dr. Ashonta Wyatt runs the non-profit Mother to Mother for moms who have lost their children to violence. She says in the 6 years she’s been doing this work, it’s never been as bad as it is now.
“I think we are about as low as we can go in terms of our dire need for some solutions.”
Dr. Wyatt also expressed how concerned she is with all 5 victims being innocent women.
“It was almost against an unwritten code that you just don’t hard women you just don’t harm children. Now that we’ve gotten to this place where women and children are up for grabs. I think it speaks to degradation of community.”
A community that she hopes will use this as a moment to band together for a solution.
“It’s not about ‘oh I’m afraid to speak’ it’s about I have to speak. Because, if I don’t it’s going to continue to devolve. We are going to get to a place where we won’t be able to do anything about it [because] it won’t be enough of us left.”