THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, September 16, 1996 TAG: 9609160045
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY LEWIS KRAUSKOPF, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: 107 lines
Jacqueline McDonald doesn't need to be reminded of bloodshed.
She has lost two sons to bullets, and she still suffers from their deaths.
But McDonald does not want her sons - or other children killed in Norfolk's streets - to have died in vain.
``We just don't want them to be forgotten,'' she said.
On Tuesday afternoon, McDonald and the non-profit group she founded - Mothers Against Crime - will march for a ``Homicide Wall,'' a memorial to children killed in Norfolk and perhaps other area cities.
The Mothers Against Crime members will join the Citizens of Hampton Roads who have been marching against poverty on Tuesdays all summer, from the old Be-Lo off Church Street two long blocks to City Hall.
On Wednesday, McDonald and other MAC members will talk with Assistant City Manager Sterling Cheatham and other poverty activists about building the memorial, among other issues.
One purpose of the wall - which the group sees as similar to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial - would be to honor the dead.
But Mothers Against Crime stresses that the wall would help the living choose a life away from crime.
MAC would like the wall built next to the fountain at City Hall - a spot near the jail. There, children who have fallen into a criminal life or those tempted by it would be shown a message.
``If they don't do right, they'll either be up on that wall or in prison,'' McDonald said.
The group likens the Norfolk wall to the memorial in Washington because in Hampton Roads, too, youths are dying in a struggle.
``These are children who have died in a war - the drug war,'' said Debra Hatcher, program director for MAC, whose daughter died in a car accident when she was 5. ``It isn't just happenstance. . . . Only these children will never get a chance to fight for their country.''
McDonald and Hatcher envision the wall as self-supporting; anyone could have a child's name inscribed into the marble memorial in return for a small donation.
A design of two angels on the wall would reflect its dual purpose, McDonald said. One angel would represent ``goodness'' - to remember those who died - and the other ``mercy'' - to protect the children who are alive.
``We want to let (the children) know that they're our angels,'' McDonald said.
McDonald arrived at the idea for the wall after seeing a memorial constructed for her first son, Dirrick, who died on his 21st birthday. Dirrick looked out for younger children in the Bronx, N.Y., housing complex where the family lived, McDonald said, so after he was shot while being robbed in 1987 the community painted a mural of him at its basketball courts.
After visiting her son's mural, McDonald realized that although not all children can be memorialized in this fashion, all early deaths should be recognized.
``We want to inject them into history, these children who have been nipped in the bud,'' Hatcher said.
McDonald started Mothers Against Crime with little funding assistance in 1990, after another son, Delvin, was shot in Park Place after an argument with men who had bumped his car in 1989. A second son's death numbed her, and only by carrying on the work of her sons - who McDonald says steered younger boys to the church and away from drugs - could she push on.
The organization began as a support group for mothers whose children had been killed. The group pitched in what money it could to help the mothers pay for burial - a problem McDonald faced when she lost her two sons and had no life insurance. Mostly, though, McDonald and her members could offer sympathy, as women who had suffered similar losses.
``She doesn't have to say how she feels,'' McDonald says of these mothers. ``We know.''
The group has grown since, in both size and breadth. Over the past few years, McDonald says Mothers Against Crime has helped with anti-drug programs for youths, and, with the help of Christ Cathedral and Christian Temple churches, distributed food to poor and homeless families in Park Place and other communities.
MAC also has helped parolees adjust to the outside world, contacting them in prison, and then, when they get out, offering support and connecting them to churches.
McDonald says the support group, which she estimates at 30 now, has helped at least 100 people. The group has expanded to include families while another MAC-led group offers spiritual help.
``There are so many people who are victims by killings and who need that support,'' said the Rev. Toney McNair of Christ Cathedral, whose church has long worked with the organization.
McDonald - who receives disability payments because of a car accident in 1987 - devotes all of her time to Mothers Against Crime. Almost seven years after Delvin's death, the work she does for the organization is what keeps her going.
``I've got two wounds,'' McDonald said, ``and these kids are going to heal them.''
The wall would be a way of healing for mothers frustrated by the senseless killings that have torn apart families, the group says.
``All the mothers can do is cry, weep and moan,'' Hatcher said. ``We just have to suffer patiently. What are we going to do, fight back with guns?'' ILLUSTRATION: Color photo by BETH BERGMAN/The Virginian-Pilot
Reggie Sands, left, Jacqueline McDonald, and Debra Hatcher, near the
site at Norfolk's jail and City Hall where they want a wall raised
to memorialize children killed by violence. The red berets are
Mothers Against Crime symbols of the children's spilled blood and
the blood of Christ.
Graphic
NEED MORE INFO?
For details about the Norfolk march and Mothers Against Crime, call
Jacqui McDonald at 627-0569 or Debra Hatcher at 855-0366. To march,
meet at the Be-Lo off Church Street at 1 p.m. Tuesday.
KEYWORDS: MOTHERS AGAINST CRIME HOMICIDE WALL by CNB