Day 331: Toddler Shot Dead In Front Of Mother In Robbery

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2297392/Sherry-West-tells-robbers-shot-sleeping-baby-Antonio-dead-Brunswick.html



A distraught mother as told how she pleaded with young robbers to spare her toddler's life before they shot him dead as he slept in his stroller.

Sherry West was pushing her 13-month-old son Antonio yards from their home in Brunswick, Georgia, early yesterday morning when she was approached by two African-American boys.

She told how one of them, who looked about 15, demanded money from her and threatened to kill her if she didn't give him any.  She told him she didn't have any.

'He said: "Well, I'm going to kill your baby", and I said "Please don't kill my baby."

Ms West added: 'I put my arms over my baby and then he shoved me and then he shot my baby right in the head.'

Ms West began CPR on Antonio but it was in vain and the infant, who had been sleeping when he was shot, died at the scene of the 9am attack.

The child's mother suffered a bullet wound to her leg which needed hospital treatment but was allowed home soon afterwards.

Antonio's father Louis Santiago said he wished he had been there to protect his son.

He told CNN: 'He was so special - he had the bluest, bluest eyes.'

Police are investigating the attack, which took place in a residential neighborhood, but have not found a weapon.

The robbers are said to be African-American, with one aged about 13-15 years and the other slightly younger.  The elder one, who shot the infant, is of thick build with curly hair, while the younger one is aged 10-12.

They fled on foot, taking nothing.

Ms West said she only realised the gun was real when she saw that the youth had shot her child dead. - Mail Online


This is the price of inaction. This is the price we pay for our apparent freedom of choice. What choice do children have when they are born into an abusive, neglectful or simply uneducated environment? The child cannot teach itself to respect life, to honour life - if the parents fail in this then the child is stuck with whatever they did learn from his/her parents. The boys who now resorted to murdering a child in front of his mother for money never stood a chance - this world they were born into never showed them an ounce of support or respect, so where else would they learn these things? They are products of our society, and we are the society.

We live and breathe and think that as long as we are happy enough then the world is right. Obviously when something goes wrong then we will change our minds, but things don't go wrong for everyone so we feel quite secure in the knowledge that we will probably never know pain and fear to the extent of what this mother, for example, now feels. We are content in living in our superficial worlds, chasing sex, money and not much else. We take our cues from the world as presented by the media and entertainment, living as if what we see in a black box is the real world and what is happening around us is just an annoying shadow.

The death of this boy could have been prevented. The deaths of every child killed directly or indirectly because of money could have been prevented. Fathers beating their wives and children because of ignorance and/or stress could have been prevented. The weekly genocide of animals could have been prevented. The pain and stress caused by job loss could have been prevented. Poverty could have been prevented.

When we stand before the countless dead in the afterlife and they ask us why we did not act, what will our reason be? I was trying to find "the one"? I had to protect my own family? I wasn't responsible? I had to focus on my career? I had to focus on my appearance? I had to make sure I was accepted by my friends and by society?

Changing the world is as simple as living the change we want to see, together.

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