A Mother Blames Police (as usual)

[CitizensGone Crazy]

June 12, 2004
 
INDIANA Two shooting deaths on the Near Northside left residents
nervous Friday and a grieving mother saying her son -- who had survived
a May 17 shooting -- should have been better protected.
The two victims, Michael Moss, 33, and April Adkisson, 24,
died early Thursday in their home in the 3500 block of Schofield Avenue.
Indianapolis police responded by parking a mobile command
post near the victims' home and assigning extra police to the
neighborhood.
But on Friday, the mobile command post was gone, although a
police car periodically cruised down the street.
Brenda Stephens, Moss' mother, was scared. She said she
wanted people to know that she didn't have any information about the
slayings.
At the same time, Stephens said she believes her son should
have been protected after he was shot May 17. He had talked to police
upon his release from the hospital.
The May shooting stemmed from Moss' attempt to get a man he
believed was dealing drugs to leave the area near his home. A short time
later, the man allegedly returned to Moss' front door and fired a gun at
him, striking him four times in one leg and once in the other.
After Moss came home, Stephens said, a detective came by and
told her, " 'I would like to help him, but I need to talk to him.' Well,
he talked to her, and this is how he got helped. He got killed."
The detective, Christine Mannina, declined to comment.
Stephens said her son was told he could get some victim
assistance money. Jennifer Wagner, a spokeswoman for the Indiana
Criminal Justice Institute, which administers the state's violent crime
compensation fund, said no application for Moss was yet on record.
Stephens did not know which fund was involved.
The suspect in the May 17 shooting, Djuan Edwards, 20, was
later arrested.
Homicide Lt. Mark Rice said earlier that he didn't know of
any request by Moss for protection.
Detective Jeff Wager said he is not able to say yet whether
Thursday's killings had any link to the May 17 shooting or to a second
shooting May 29, when a neighbor of Moss', Jermaine Foster, was wounded,
and Foster's friend, Michael Solomon, was killed.
According to neighbors and family members, the two friends
had seen Edwards and another man in a car nearby and had gone to Moss'
home to warn him. As the two returned to Solomon's car, the shooting
started.
A few days later, Edwards was arrested. He has been charged
with murder, attempted murder, aggravated battery and carrying a handgun
without a permit and has remained in the Marion County Jail since.
Stephens said her son, who worked with her in her real
estate broker and appraisal business, had been worried for his safety
and had stayed a number of nights elsewhere. But on Wednesday, he was
home.
According to police, Moss and his girlfriend appeared to
have been asleep when their assailant or assailants broke inside about
1:30 a.m. Thursday.
The recent shootings have shaken neighborhood residents
already becoming concerned about crime. Last year, within a quarter-mile
of Moss' home, IPD recorded three armed robberies, 12 aggravated
assaults, 24 other assaults, 12 burglaries and 23 thefts.
In December, a convenience store owner, French Tibbs, said
residents near his store at 26th and Harding streets don't talk to
police because they are afraid of getting hurt. "People are scared to
death."