Little Rock drive-by shootings up in 2017, data show

Bullets fired at homes shatter wood, glass, also sense of safety, victims say

FILE - Police investigate a drive-by shooting in the 4500 block of West 25th Street in this Feb. 9, 2017 file photo.
FILE - Police investigate a drive-by shooting in the 4500 block of West 25th Street in this Feb. 9, 2017 file photo.

Little Rock police responded to 147 terroristic acts, the charge for drive-by shootings without injury, in the first 10 months of 2018. Terroristic acts include all crimes in which someone shoots or projects an object at a residence or vehicle with the intent to cause injury or damage. Use the menu in the upper-left corner to view terroristic act reports in previous years.

The bullet came through their daughter's window early on a still morning in a quiet west Little Rock neighborhood.

Tawana Shelton woke her husband, Robert, suddenly realizing that the loud noise was gunshots. On Sept. 7, multiple bullets hit the two-story home where four of the Sheltons' children were inside sleeping, shattering the front door, cracking windows and leaving holes in the home's gray paneling.

No one was injured in the gunfire, Tawana Shelton said, but the family is changed.

"We don't feel safe," she said days after the shooting. "It's just fear. Who would do this? That unknown -- it feels like someone is out there and you just don't know. It violated our home."

Since Jan. 1, 2011, there have been more than 1,200 terroristic acts -- a common police categorization for drive-by shootings -- in Little Rock, according to data from the Police Department.

When each shooting is indicated on a map, it creates a scattershot effect with few neighborhoods untouched. Arkansas defines a terroristic act as a crime in which a person shoots or projects an object toward an occupied or occupiable structure or vehicle with the intention to cause injury or to damage property.

On average since 2011, Little Rock has seen about 150 terroristic acts a year, but in 2017 alone there were 239 such crimes, according to Little Rock police data.

This year, as of Oct. 16, there have been 147 terroristic acts reported in Little Rock.

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, drive-by shootings -- viewed as highly dangerous and primarily gang-related -- captured the nation's attention, much as mass shootings have today.

A 2016 New York Times investigation that tracked shootings that injured or killed more than four people in 2015 showed that drive-by shootings and mass shootings often overlap. About one-third of the cases investigated were drive-by shootings or gang-indicative activity, the report said.

"Bullets don't have a name on it," said Rolanda Foreman, whose apartment on Sanford Drive in Little Rock was hit by gunfire on July 1 while her 4-year-old son slept just a few feet away. "Bullets don't have eyes. They just go."

Even if you aren't the intended target, if the shooter meant to threaten or harm a neighbor, a person walking outside or if there was no target at all, Foreman said, the gunshots put everyone in the vicinity in danger. The nature of drive-by shootings leaves its victims feeling unsafe in their own homes, Tawana Shelton said. The shooting at her home has left her with one haunting question: Why?

WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?

Tawana Shelton said she and her husband made sure their children were safe before calling 911 on the night of the shooting. And when police arrived, what could she tell them? The family had been asleep inside; no one saw a car or could describe a shooter.

"We had no idea of the magnitude of it," Robert Shelton said as he and his wife sat in their living room, a dozen feet from where a bullet shattered the front door. "We were just in shock. This is our home. This is where our kids play."

The Sheltons' case is rare. North Little Rock police major crimes Sgt. J.L. Dancy said in most cases, the homeowner knows the shooter or at least knows something of why the shots were fired.

"Crime comes down to money, dope or passion," Dancy said. "It's usually one of those three things. The majority of terroristic acts don't just randomly occur."

Though the majority of cases are not random, Dancy said, innocent people can get caught in the crossfire of a dispute in which they have no part.

In a recent investigation, Dancy said, a home might have been mistaken for the residence of another person. In other cases, a dispute between two people can end in an unconnected residence being shot, he said.

These cases cannot be prosecuted as terroristic acts because the gunmen lack the intent to cause damage or injury as specified in Arkansas' definition of the crime. Instead, a shooter who injures no one and did not intend to shoot the home could be charged with destruction of property, which carries a far lighter sentence, Dancy said.

In any case, a home is shot and the people who live there are frightened.

"Those bullets go somewhere," Dancy said. "Are there innocent individuals caught in crossfire? Absolutely. The people who have absolutely no idea why this happened, they're the ones willing to help us out."

After a terroristic act -- or any incident that involves a house being shot -- Dancy said officers look for shell casings to help them identify the weapon. Officers investigate the number of times the house was struck -- the higher the number, the higher the likelihood that the shooter intended to hit the home.

The casings are registered in the National Integrated Ballistic Information Network, a database of bullet "fingerprints" that helps investigators track the guns that have been used at different scenes.

Sometimes, the Police Department receives anonymous tips that lead officers to the shooter, he said. The primary factor in investigating almost every shooting, he said, is aid from the community.

Someone in the neighborhood likely saw something or at least understands the controversies and dynamics in the area -- information that can lead to an arrest, he said. All too often though, people stay quiet, and the cases go unsolved, he said.

"The stats for convictions on terroristic acts is probably very low," Dancy said. "The lack of cooperation, that's the No. 1 factor."

Spokesmen for the Little Rock Police Department declined to comment for this article.

A COMMUNITY CONCERN

In Foreman's case, a bullet crashed into her kitchen cabinet. Another tore through her son's toy bike. Later, when recounting that July 1 night, Foreman shook her head and sighed.

"What if my son had been awake?" she said. "What if I had been in the kitchen? To put so many people in danger like that, I don't think [shooters] think about it."

In the hours after the shooting, Foreman said many of her neighbors and their children were upset. Even the people whose apartments were not hit were nervous, she said, because it could so easily have been them. In a police report, a next-door neighbor said she was the intended target, and Foreman was just caught in the middle.

According to data from the Little Rock Police Department, apartment complexes often have a concentration of terroristic acts. Of the 12 addresses where terroristic acts happened more than four times since 2011, 10 locations were apartment complexes and two were houses. The two houses were for sale as of late October.

Arkansas law does not require that real estate agents disclose to prospective tenants or buyers any suicides, homicides or other felonies -- including terroristic acts -- that occurred on the property. In fact, the law specifically states that agents and appraisers cannot be held liable for not disclosing such crimes.

Like the Sheltons, Foreman's case is a bit rare: arrests were made in that shooting. Wesley Kirkpatrick, 24, and Siddick Bubakar Haidara, 19, were arrested on July 3 in the Sanford Drive shooting and in a drive-by shooting on Wolfe Street days earlier.

In the days after the shooting at her apartment, Foreman said her 4-year-old son clung to her leg. The little boy, normally outgoing and adventurous, was afraid, she said.

"I don't think he knows," she said. "I think he sensed my energy. He wouldn't sleep in his room."

For drive-by shooting victims like Foreman and the Sheltons, there is also a fear of retribution. Many people whose homes were struck by bullets in the past few months declined to comment for this article. Those who would speak were unwilling to have their photos taken, saying they fear making themselves targets.

Foreman said she believes the proliferation of drive-by shootings and other crimes comes from a lack of community.

"I was brought up to believe it takes a village to raise a child," she said. "We've lost that village, and without it, it's hard to stop [violent crime]. Police can only do so much. People have gotten so lax. They care about themselves and not the person next to them."

Stephan Mann, president of the Meadowcliff and Brookwood neighborhood association, said he, too, believes strengthening communities will help alleviate violent crime.

"I tell people at every meeting, 'Look after your neighbor. Notice when their car is gone or when you see someone you don't know at their house. Watch out for each other,'" Mann said. "I truly believe the reason these things occur is because you don't have people who are community-oriented. If you don't get involved and stay active, criminals can take over your neighborhood."

Mann's neighborhoods have relatively low violent-crime rates. And every time something happens in his area, Mann is among the first to know about it. He laments the loss of the local policeman who knows everyone and everything about a neighborhood. A cop-in-the-know could lead to quicker arrests and more understanding on all sides, he said.

And, neighborhood associations are generally concerned about what's going on in their neighborhoods, he said. It's the people who don't attend association meetings who worry him.

"Really often it's the rental houses and apartments where you see trouble," Mann said. "Those people aren't here for long, and they don't have a reason to invest in the community."

Mann said he tries to reach out to everyone in the Meadowcliff and Brookwood neighborhoods -- long-term residents and renters alike -- because he believes the community is safer if each person has ties to the area.

"People with their eyes open, they see what's going on in their neighborhoods," he said. "When neighbors start being neighbors again, we will see crime start to disappear."

Until then, victims like the Sheltons wonder what comes next.

For five years, they considered their west Little Rock house perfect. The couple picked the two-story residence for its sprawling backyard for the kids and the number of rooms for relatives to stay in while visiting.

More importantly, the house felt safe.

"Maybe we'll move," Robert Shelton said when asked what the next step is for his family. "Before this happened, I never thought this would happen. Nothing bad like this. There just ... there are no steps to take."

Metro on 11/11/2018

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