If the first quarter in Baltimore was celebrated for its reductions in violent crime, then the beginning of the second saw a sobering spate.
Since Thursday there have been 13 shootings and 7 killings around the city.
66-year-old Delcina Whitehead says you can crunch those numbers how you want, all she knows is her 65-year-old neighbor, grandmother Pinky Louise Ruffin was shot and killed sitting on her porch in Southwest Baltimore.
"We used to sit out until it got dark and then we would go in,” Whitehead said, “Now, you don’t even want the kids to come out and play...that's terrible."
Because the 3900 block of West Mulberry Street, lined with cherry blossoms, used to be immune.
It is part of a pocket neighborhood just south of Edmonson Avenue on the city's southwest side and filled with mostly with senior citizens; an almost earned serenity Commissioner Darryl De Sousa made sure he respected when he visited with Ms. Whitehead as he saw her looking out her door.
The commissioner explained how her 65-year-old neighbor was not the target of the shooting Saturday night.
It was 22-year-old Marquis Patterson.
Still, two people are dead and the commissioner told us his people know who pulled the triggers.
"It's unacceptable,” De Sousa said, “The level of violence we saw this weekend is unacceptable but I would say this Brian, is that we know it's not random. It is very direct. We know the players, we know the participants, the combatants...we know who they are."
And after a weekend of emergency meetings and setting immediate deployments for the next 48 hours, the commissioner said they're coming for them.
But no matter how quickly they are caught, folks like Ms. Whitehead are still left in the wake of the violent act.
Her despair challenging his determination.
"There is nothing that man can do,” Whitehead said peeking out of her door, “These people don't respect him, their parents. You know I feel sort of bad for him or anybody that gets that position because these people are possessed by Satan."
