"Dear Jesus, my baby is dead. God knows they didn't have to kill my baby boy!"
Those words echoed throughout the tiny chapel. When Evette uttered them, her body went limp and fell into the stoic grips of her deacon, as they held her upright by each arm while she peered into the casket that contained her only son.
Had Darcy lived, he would have been 13 years old on the very same day people gathered in that church to mourn his death.
Up until his death, Lil' D (as he was more commonly known in the circles and streets that he had travelled) had been a dealer of crack cocaine. He had usually made anywhere from $1600 to $2500 a week. He started at the age of 12 as a lookout and runner, making only $200 a week. Enterprising young man that he was, shortly thereafter he worked his way up to dealer. In fact, several of the lookouts/runners who had worked for him were present at his wake. Some of them, I suspect, will have taken over Lil' D's customers by now.
Lil' D had made quite a name for himself, and, having done so, may have precipitated his death. He was known to be frequently carrying large sums of money. The man and woman who robbed and killed him are still at large.
I do not wish to appear uncaring or insensitive to his mother, because I know that her pain in his death is most real, yet I feel that her pain is rivalled only by the magnitude of her hypocrisy.
Lil' D loved his mother very much, and he lavished upon her an endless stream of expensive gifts that obviously were proceeds from his drug dealing enterprise. He bought Evette a beautiful diamond ring, three magnificent fur coats and a host of other things. He even opened a bank account for her surreptitious use, cloaked in the name of his younger sister.
Indeed, in those days, Evette was often heard saying, "I don't ask where he gets the money. All I know is that my baby boy takes good care of his family."
She was very proud of that. Alas, Lil' D was barely 13 years old, with no job, buying all sorts of new clothes, shoes, etc, rarely going to school and staying out until the wee hours of the morning. Surely, it must have occurred to Evette that he was engaged in some sort of illegal activity at some point - before his death.
Evette could have turned down that four carat diamond ring, the fur coats and the bank account. Moreover, because he loved her so much, she could have effectively demanded that he go back to school in earnest and stay off the streets at night.
Unfortunately, being driven by greed and the need to adorn herself in pretentious glitter, Evette chose to turn a blind eye to what even the most gullible of mothers would have instantly known - that her son was in the illegal drug business. All the gifts Lil' D lavished on Evette, in essence, helped take his life.
Shame on you Evette, and shame on us, if we are not concerned.
The names here have been changed, but I assure you that the facts are true, and that there are more Evettes and Lil' Ds out there than you might imagine.
[The writer is a prisoner on death row in the United States. He is happy to receive letters commenting on his columns. He can be written to at: Brandon Astor Jones, EF-122216, G2-51, GD&CC, PO Box 3877, Jackson, GA 30233, USA.]