No Arrests yet for Easter Weekend murders

In the past seven days, six persons were viciously murdered. In the old capital, four families are grieving and in the Hattieville community, two other families are looking for answers for the murders of their own. Police beefed up their presence in the Old Capital but that was no match for the criminals. There have been no arrests so far as News Five’s Isani Cayetano reports.

Isani Cayetano, Reporting

The murder of twenty-two year old Kevin Pott, who was mowed down in a spray of gunfire on Monday night while walking along Mahogany Street with his girlfriend, like several others over the violent Easter weekend remains unsolved.  Ironically, the vicious slaying took place in the same vicinity where Edward Lord met his fate in June of last year, in an open area adjacent to Brick City Barbershop.  Pott, upon reaching the neighborhood came under fire from an unknown assailant who rode up on him.  Multiple shots were fired and when it was all said and done he laid mortally wounded in a patch of grass.  His girlfriend, eighteen year old Shanice Rowland, is lucky to be alive after being hit in the right breast.  She remains in a stable condition at the K.H.M.H.  Despite recovering four expended nine millimeter shells from the scene police are no closer to solving the homicide.

Herman Lanza

Likewise, the ruthless murder of thirty-seven year old Herman Lanza a few blocks away just two nights prior, remains mysterious.  Lanza, an infamous street figure who rose to notoriety with the likes of Frank Castro and Mark ‘T Dogg’ Stewart in the late nineties, was shot numerous times to the body as he stood in front of Ricky’s Store on Pointsetta Street.  He too was blindsided by a gunman who spared him no mercy.  Similarly, Scenes of Crimes personnel were able to retrieve several spent shells from the area; however, an arrest is yet to be made.

The third homicide, the murder of Leron Johnson on Holy Thursday, is also without fruitful leads.  Johnson, who was dispatched on Custard Apple Street near Fabers Road Extension, was on a routine errand for his employer when he was presumably lured to his death.

Kevin Pott

The killing would inevitably be the first of an extremely violent weekend; not to mention the broad daylight murder of Michael Garbutt on Wednesday afternoon.  While the incidents that pursued Johnson’s murder may not be related, the spate of crimes during the holidays flouted the Police Department’s efforts to reduce crime by adding further manpower to patrol the streets of the Old Capital.  The many indiscriminate shootings which occurred over the weekend are equally unsettled. Reporting for News Five, I am Isani Cayetano.