05/28/2024
Lakesha Holmes was frying some fish in the kitchen one Tuesday evening when she caught a quick glimpse of her son Brandon outside. Before the two could catch up about their day, the teen scurried off to a friend’s home.
Holmes didn’t take it personally. She figured Brandon, who’d turned 16 just four days earlier, would be home soon. She also didn’t give too much thought to a rat-tat-tat of gunfire that cracked the dark, cool air outside a few minutes later. There’s always gunfire, she thought.
A moment later, Brandon collapsed at the front door and was bleeding from gunshot wounds. It was the last time Holmes would see her son alive.
“It’s hell,” she said this summer, sitting in her living room as she talked about the star high school athlete who will never finish his quest to become a professional football player. “I know it’s reality. But it’s hard.”
Brandon was one of the first Texas teens killed with a gun this year after he was shot Jan. 10 somewhere between a friend’s house and his family’s apartment in Baytown, a suburb east of Houston. Holmes still doesn’t know why Brando. was shot — or who pulled the trigger.
One hundred and seventy-three more youths in Texas died from gunshot wounds in the eight months that followed Shane’s death, according to state health data. Each death represents a growing, gruesome trend. In 2020, gunshots became the leading cause of death for Texas youths. The number of youths — those younger than 18 — killed by guns in Texas went up from around 100 a decade ago to over 300 in 2023.
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