AURORA, Colo. — A shooting that killed a 14-year-old girl in Aurora Saturday forces another family and community into grief.
The girl, identified as Kamiaya Cleveland, died and two other teens were injured in the shooting during a party at Highland Hollows Park Saturday night. No arrests have been made, and police said they have not identified a suspect or suspects yet. Police said the shooting stemmed from inside the party and was a random, one-off, violent act.
"They should be able to party peacefully, hang out peacefully," said Joel Hodge, co-founder of Struggle of Love Foundation.
Hodge's nonprofit works to curb youth violence. He said trauma is becoming too familiar in the lives of young people.
"It’s just this poison, disease, in our community that’s lasting and lasting and getting worse and worse and worse and worse," Hodge said.
Hodge said he was called to Highland Hollows Park after shots rang out from a party that turned into a fight. He said he took five kids home.
"It's really frantic," Hodge said. "Anxiety is racing. Depression kicks in when they find out who it is. Then they’re scared now. Don’t want to go to any more events. Then they’re confused."
Hodge said a lack of firearm education is a large part of senseless violence. He said kids likely don't have a full understanding of how serious it is to possess a weapon or how quickly it can change multiple lives.
"They may shoot somebody by accident and may not really understand it, that this is taking a life, until they wake up in prison," Hodge said.
Hodge works alongside violence prevention supervisor Jason McBride at the foundation. McBride said trauma is engrained in today's youth.
"It’s something we’ve been dealing with over and over and over for the last 10, 15 years," McBride said. "And it’s something that, quite frankly, is unbelievably challenging and frustrating to deal with."
McBride said, like Saturday's shooting, most youth violence is preventable.
"This is a problem," McBride said. "It could be catastrophic and it’s turning out to be, because we are losing the only natural resources we have as Black people, as those are our young people."
McBride said Highland Hollows Park is an easy spot for teens to congregate, because there's a limited number of light sources. He said young people know they can go there and not be seen.
McBride said proper lighting across the park, in addition to equitable distribution of funding to youth programming and education access, will help support the Struggle of Love's mission.
"We have got to get back to putting our kids first," McBride said.
McBride said if these crimes continue to happen, victims will keep getting younger and younger.
"We’ll be talking about 11 and 10-year-olds, 9 and 10-year-olds in the next three to four years on the news, and nobody wants to see that," McBride said.
Hodge said their organization is working to connect with the children present at the party Saturday who may need trauma support. He said he is willing to be a resource to the victim's family however they may need as they process the permanent consequence of teen violence.
"It’s disturbing," Hodge said. "It truly is."
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