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A Year Later — Family and Friends Remember Shem Walker During Emotional Candlelight Vigil

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On July 11, 2009, a man was sitting on the stoop of the Walker family home at 370 Lafayette Avenue. Because the house is a few doors down from a suspected drug house, Mr. Shem Walker was accustomed to shooing away loiterers from his property. In the past, the drug dealers or street people who were sitting, simply left. But this time the man Mr. Walker confronted to leave the property was an undercover police officer, and this time Mr. Walker was shot dead.
It’s been a year since the shooting and District Attorney spokesperson Jerry Schmetterer said that nothing has been referred to the DA’s office from the police department. The NYPD has also given no word to the family on what, if anything, is being investigated. Family and friends remember Shem Walker.
 
 

 

Shavon Walker, Daughter
One year ago today, the person who I saw as my hero, my Savior, other than Jesus Christ, was killed right here.   Only my family can feel the pain that we feel every day walking back and forth.  From a place that was supposed to  be a sanctuary.  But it’s not the same.  The person who took my father’s life is still living his life day-to-day.  Going home to his family.  Smiling and laughing.  And he doesn’t feel the pain that we feel on a daily basis. 
The sentimental things, the laughter.  The jokiness.  Just the kind person that he was, we no longer have.  Is it fair?  I think not.
Do we need justice? Absolutely.  Will this justice system fail us?  We shall see.  It is up to us as a community to rise above this and take a stand that this will not happen to anyone again. 
I’m making a plea right now, to those in the neighborhood.  This step needs to be precious.   To hang out on the step, which is the reason why my father got into a scuffle, is wrong.  I’m just asking that there should be no trespassing, period.  That’s a plea, a personal plea from me.  I come here, I pass here so many times, and when I pass here and I see people standing here and I say “It’s happening again.”
If my dad was here he would tell you to come off the stairs.  Why is it still happening?  A life was taken from us and we’re still having the same perpetuating behavior.
Today, I’m making a plea to the community: We must all stick together and take a lesson from what happened here at 370 Lafayette Avenue, July 11th, last year. 
My father is gone from us, but he is still not forgotten.  We have two lovely new additions to our family and we’re blessed.  God took one away from us but he brought us back two. We’re living through them, thank you.

Mrs. Walker, Mother
“I was Shem’s mother.  Last year on the 11th, a Saturday evening, Shem went to the fast-food store and he bought me some food.  He came in and give me the food, but something wasn’t right.  So I said, ‘Shem, I can’t eat this food, you take it.’  He emptied my bowl into his plate and went into the kitchen and ate.  When he finished he went outside and he had a piece of cake.   He put the piece in my mouth and he said, ‘Mommy, I’m going to get a smoke.’
“The next time I saw my son there he is in a casket. Died.  What for?  They say he went to the store and he came back and he sees somebody sitting on the steps.  Don’t mind how abrupt he said to the man, ‘Get off!’ or ‘Move!’  How come my son ends up dead?  You mean to tell me two trained police, one on this step and one on the next step.  They couldn’t subdue one innocent, unarmed man without using gun force?  I don’t think this is it.  I just don’t think that is right.  So all I’m asking for now is for justice.  The man who killed my son, and it was like he killed me.  My sight has gone since then.  All I’m asking for now is justice for my son.  Justice for Shem.”

Reverend Michael Bacchus, Full Gospel Assembly
What I know of Shem, he’d come from Pennsylvania on weekends, get his mother on Sunday mornings and bring her to church. He’d bring his car up on the sidewalk, take his mom out of the car and put her in the wheelchair, get her into the church, get on the elevator, bring her up into the sanctuary and she sits right in the back.  When church is finished, Shem comes back again, gets his mom in the reverse order and brings his mother home.  I don’t know all the other pieces, but I can say I saw that this was a son who was very loving, very caring and very dutiful for his mom. And I believe that’s a golden heart that he took the time to be there for his mother, in the house of the Lord, week after week.  I want to honor the family, especially the young man who is currently bringing his grandmother, Sunday after Sunday, he brings her to church.  That’s the same thing that Shem was doing.  

Councilwoman Letitia
The Walker family is pursuing a civil action, but the District Attorney should at least reach out to the family and explain where things are at this time.  Whether or not there is an active investigation. Or whether it’s closed, and if closed, why?  I think they are owed that reason and that explanation.  A year without justice for Shem Walker is really unfortunate.  And without any interaction with the District Attorney’s office, I just believe this family deserves better.
If you’re selling drugs, you are the enemy.  You’re tearing our community apart.  Families have been torn apart by drugs.  It’s because individuals sold drugs on this corner and at that corner at Classon Avenue, Shem is not here.  We want a community where our mothers and grandmothers are safe and where children can play without worrying about drug dealers.  Let this message be the message we take away from the life of Shem Walker.  That’s the message here today. Justice for this family, but also at the same time (community), we have got to stand up and do the right thing. 

Lydia Phillips, Aunt
It’s been one year now since that cop shot my nephew on these same steps.  They said they were undercover. The guy was sitting on the steps and my nephew told him no loitering here and told him to get up.  His partner came up the steps and told my nephew he couldn’t tell the guy who was sitting on the steps to move. My nephew told him there was no loitering and he took his gun out and shot my nephew twice in the chest and in the forehead.  This is a family building.  My niece came out.  And if someone comes out and says this is my brother, they still took him to the hospital as a John Doe.
Since then, there has been nothing.  The case has not gone to a grand jury or anything like that.  One year.  Nothing has happened.  All they’re saying is that they’re investigating.

Asthma Self-Help for African-Americans

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Asthma in the African-American child may be caused by things other than what is commonly suggested.  In many African-American homes sometimes we do things that others might not be doing, such as burning incense.  Incense has a flux that comes off like any burning weed or leaf and that might be causing a child to have asthma.  So I would advise anybody that has asthmatic children, not to burn any of those types of things in their homes.  The roach is a big problem because the exoskeleton comes off and disintegrates into a protein dust which is highly allergenic.  Mite dust is another problem.   In your mattress, there are mites that eat the dead skin that flakes off your body.  These mites defecate and their waste is called mite dust.  Every time you roll over in a mattress, that dust comes up.  So people should really spend more money replacing mattresses than on doctor visits and medicines. 
Also, the residual remains of roach bombs does not easily dissipate, particularly in the winter when everything is closed up to keep the heat in.  Everything else stays as well.   If you also use a gas stove to heat a house, you get a lot of non-combustibles coming in, carbon dioxide, things like that, and you run the danger of creating a negative pressure in the house.  This negative pressure can draw gases back down a flue, gases that should be released to the outside.  This is how many people get carbon monoxide poisoning.   This is very common, and yet it gets treated as though it were the flu or some kinds of upset stomach, or headache you think is do to a cold. 
When you bring your clothing home from the dry cleaner, air it out well before you bring it into your closet.  Because perchloroethylene is a very toxic chemical.  
In African-American homes, we use a lot of disinfectants, pine and different kinds of detergents and cleaners.  Any of these aerosol products that have aromas, floral scents, should not be used in the home around children.  There are many chemicals in the spray system of the can.
Of course, there should be no smoking in a house with children.  No smoking at all.   A baby=s lungs are very sensitive and susceptible to damage from cigarette smoke.  There is not one thing in the diet that can=t cause asthma.  You can have asthma from eating one type of food.  I had a patient who went to see her daughter at college, and she went into a little restaurant and had some chili, without knowing they had used peanuts in the preparation.   She ate it and died from an asthmatic attack. 
One of the biggest things found now in many foods is sulfite.  We have something in our bodies called sulfite oxidase which can oxidize the sulfite when it comes into our bodies.  But that enzyme system is limited in the amount of work it can do.  When it gets overloaded the system shuts down and you end up with a lot of sulfites moving through your body causing difficulty.  Researchers have found that you can protect the sulfite oxidase by using vitamin B-12.  If you look in any allergy journal sulfites is high on the list.  In fact, they have outlawed sulfites on store lunch counters, where they were used to keep the vegetables looking fresh.  Sulfites are used mostly for cosmetic purposes.  They keep tuna fish white, and the fruint in fruitcake  red, orange, pink or yellow.  Dried fruits have to be sulfited to keep their color.  White raisins are kept white by sulfites. 
A big problem that children have is with the sulfites in the quarter-water drinks.  If you go into the average Bodega and you=ll find a wide variety of these drinks, and many with sulfites.  These sulfites can build up in the body and constrict the small bronchi leading into air sacs of the lungs, triggering an asthmatic attack.   These drinks also cause hyperactivity in children because of the intense fructose that=s in it.  It intoxicates the brain.  Then there are also dyes they have put in these things to hold the color.  So the result is a variety of chemicals going into your body that the body was never designed to handle and can=t even recognize.  Give your children juices instead of the colored water drinks.  Read the labels carefully.  If this was done, it would reduce asthma as much as one-quarter. 
These drugs that are used to treat asthma are horrible.   They make children nervous, and upset, and prevent them from functioning well in school.   The pharmaceutical companies do produce some lifesaving products, but they are also profit-making enterprises, manufacturing products which they recommend be used daily.  These companies are not necessarily the best source of information on how  to prevent asthma in a more natural and safe way.   Examine everything you take into your body and remove those things that have asthma-causing properties.   Be aware of your environment and of the air quality around you.  An air purifier can have a very beneficial effect for asthmatics.    and don=t forget, consult with your allergist or doctor before changing or discontinuing any medication.

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Denzel Washington and Viola Davis Tear Down Fences on Broadway

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Time is running out to check out Denzel Washington’s powerful performance in the hit revival of Fences.

His acclaimed role as patriarch Troy, in the first Broadway revival of August Wilson’s classic drama, has earned him amazing critical raves, sold-out performances, and a prestigious Tony Award for Best Actor in a Drama. Fences is running at the Cort Theater until July 11.

Denzel and Viola in stellar performances in August Wilson's "Fences"

After a five-year lapse from the New York theater, the two-time Oscar winner (Glory and Training Day) and New York metro area native has returned triumphantly to the stage. Now, its under the direction of Kenny Leon, who won acclaim bringing Sean Combs to Broadway in the Tony winning revival of Lorraine Hansberry’s Raisin in the Sun. Leon, now Broadway’s leading African-American director, was mentored by both Wilson and Lloyd Richards, Wilson’s longtime director who headed Yale University’s drama school and directed the original production of “Raisin in the Sun.” Leon, the director of August Wilson’s “Century Cycle” of plays at the Kennedy Center, had been nominated for Tony Awards for August Wilson’s “Gem of the Ocean” and “Radio Golf.” Through his brilliant production of “Fences,” the play picked up a coveted Tony Award for “Best Play Revival.”
Weeks before the star-studded opening of “Fences,” I found myself sitting at a roundtable interview at Sardi’s Restaurant with Washington and the cast. It gave me flashbacks to attending a special 1987 press dinner with August Wilson, James Earl Jones, director Lloyd Richards and the original cast of “Fences” at the Alconquin Hotel, another legendary theater gathering space.

I had covered Washington during his New York Off-Broadway theater days at the Negro Ensemble Company and Woodie King’s New Federal Theater. Back in the late 70’s and early 80’s, Washington was considered a major New York theater actor. He was a leading actor in high profile Off -Broadway productions like his Obie Award -winning performance in the Negro Ensemble Company production of Charles Fuller’s “A Soldier’s Play, which earned a Pulitzer Prize (he revived his role on film in “A Soldier’s Story”). Portraying Malcolm X in Laurence Holder’s “When The Chickens Come Home to Roost,” produced by Woodie King, mesmerized audiences, including a young Spike Lee, who later cast Washington in his Oscar-nominated role of Malcolm X.

Yet his Broadway turns in the Ron Milner-Woodie King production of “Checkmates” and later in the drama “Julius Caesar” received little accolades.

The idea to come back to the New York stage began when Hollywood producer Scott Rudin brought Washington a screenplay of “Fences” and tried to persuade him to make the film. Instead, it compelled Washington to read August Wilson’s play.

“I went and read the play and cried. Then laughed. It’s a great, great, great, great play,” recalled Washington, casually dressed in jeans and a tee shirt and still strikingly handsome in his fifties.

“Very rarely to you get to work and interpret the work of a master. A grand master. And August Wilson is one. He is Eugene O’Neill. He is Tennessee Williams and Arthur Miller. It’s a masterpiece,” Washington stated. “I’ve been around. I’ve read a lot of plays and screenplays. “Knowing he’s gone and I fortunately got a chance to meet him. You can feel him. His plays are spiritual.”

The international movie star likes his new role being back on the New York stage. “What I love about theater and what I love about it now, given the position that I’m in, is that it gives me a chance to be one of the guys,” he stressed. “I’m another member of the cast. I have a role to play. This is what I love.”

“This is how I started as an actor in the theater right up the block at Lincoln Center,” he explained. “When I left New York in 1982, I was doing a Pulitzer Prize winning play. I had just done When The Chickens Come Home to Roost and followed that up with A Soldier’s Play, which won a Pulitzer Prize. I left to go to LA to do what I thought was a 13-week job called St. Elsewhere. Four kids and 25 years whatever years later, I started working my way back. I never really felt that LA was my home. New York is my home. Now we have a home here.”

Although at 55, he is a similar age to James Earl Jones, when Jones created Troy on Broadway, Washington brings a different type of theatrical magnetism to the role.
“They are specific about this African American family, but the themes are universal. The husband and wife relationship, the bitterness of the husband about not being successful in life, dreams deferred, and the father and son relationship,” said Washington. “All of those themes-black, white, blue, green and yellow-we all relate to them.”
Viola Davis, who portrays wife Rose, was undeterred about possible comparisons with actress Mary Alice, who was in the original production. Davis is a Broadway star and August Wilson favorite. She won a Tony, Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle Awards for Wilson’s King Hedley II and grabbed Tony, Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle nominations for his drama Seven Guitars.

“It’s always easier when people have no expectations, because then you are always going to be surprised,” said Davis, who believes the audience has to be open. “You have to come with a blank slate and then you have to allow whatever the actors are doing to infuse you, to move you.”
The Julliard trained actress has been appearing in TV and films since 1996. She’s been featured in director’s Steven Soderberg’s Traffic and Syriana and Jim Sheridan’s Get Rich or Die Tryin.’ Also, she’s been popular with Black directors like Denzel Washington’s Antoine Fisher, George Wolfe’s Nights in Rodanthe and Debbie Allen’s Lifetime film The Fantasia Barrino Story: Life is Not a Fairy Tale.
Yet, it was her heartbreaking performance in the film Doubt as the mother of the lone African American child in a strict Catholic school in the sixties that earned her national acclaim. The scene stealing performance with Meryl Streep scooped up Oscar, Golden Globe, SAG and Critics Choice Awards nominations. Audiences can currently see her on HBO’s United States of Tara and the Tom Cruise movie Knight and Day. This summer, she plays Julia Roberts’ best friend in the highly awaited Eat Pray Love.
Returning to the work of August Wilson and creating such a poignant performance as Rose in Fences has won the actress raves and another Tony Award. “We all have a little Wilsonisque in us,” explained Davis. “Because it’s our experience. It an African-American experience. Our mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers our grandparents.”

Parks Commish Jack Linn Halts Soil Dump In Charlie’s Place Court as Area Residents Play Hardball Against Unsanctioned “Green” Effort

Bernice Elizabeth Green
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“You’re telling me, someone came to our community, took a pile of dirt, didn’t bother to come to us, and just dumped it on a playground’s handball court?” that was the question local architect Michael McCaw raised at a meeting called by CB3 chair Henry Butler, yesterday at Bedford Stuyvesant Restoration community room. “Are they crazy?”
The site is the handball court at Charlie’s Place playground on Hopkins Avenue, between Tompkins and Throop. The player is a wealthy funding organization that has a long history of good works in and intentions for the area, the Parks Department and the Department of Education.
There’s CB3 and very vocal residents of the North Brooklyn neighborhood, occupants of houses and apartments near and around the park. The CBO and the enclave were left out of the picture. One day, the handball court was there, as it always has been since the playground’s naming, in 1957, after Charles Lubin, founder of Sara Lee company. The next day the handball court was under ground, beneath a generous attempt to create a small farm or garden in the space.
This green initiative elicited big groans that increased in intensity yesterday when the residents – mostly strong, focused and able young men – and CB3 officers met with Parks Assistant Commissioner/Senior Counselor Jack T. Linn and a Mr. Hunte, representing the greening agency “to design a plan relative to the community’s needs.”
“Not enough,” said a community member buoyed by CB3 member Beatrice P. Jones’ remarks. She said, to applause: “We’re not opposed to gardens. We love gardens. We love fruit, vegetables and flowers.
“But the community will not allow a garden to be established in that handball court. So I think we need to take our shovels and remove it. I need manure for my garden, anyway. Somebody in your agency . maybe not you, but someone, made a big mistake. Our young people are here trying to resolve this. Give them back their handball court. If you don’t have the manpower, we will get it.”
Butler, staunch community advocate, stated that the Community Board should have been approached about the project or plans for potential projects before they even come into the neighborhood. “Not informed of what already has been done.”
And although a few residents were willing to compromise on a half court; half garden arrangement, most everyone came to the conclusion – with Butler and Linn in agreement -the process had to start all over and done the correct way.
So, Next steps: The community has called for a tour of Charlie’s Place, Wednesday, July 7 at 6pm to find a more appropriate site for the garden, other than on the 50-plus year old handball court.
Meanwhile, Linn stated that in the interests of the community, “Mr. Hunte will stop work; a decision will be made on where he should move the work; and on how it will be moved.” With the involvement of the Board and the community at every decision-making level.
CB3’s Parks, Arts & culture chair Marion Little assured residents the park is being is placed at the top of the Board’s priority list, and he will be working with Mr. Butler to have some Board meetings in the North Bedford Stuyvesant area. He said, “That the handball court, used daily, is shut down at the start of summer.. now that’s a big problem.”
Manager Charlene Phillips, CB3 District Manager, closed with a reminder to everyone in the room: “Anyone who pays taxes should be kept informed of what’s going on where they pay taxes, and they should have a say in where those taxes go. You have rights, you need to exercise them.”
Ultimately, “it’s about respect,” said both Nilo Jordan and Rafael Dominguez who frequent the park, and exercise there.
Jordan, Dominguez and Anthony Mercado strongly urge the public to come out and see community empowerment in action and to wrap their thoughts around, yet, another Charlie’s Place pressing situation they’re tackling: the parking lot and people who should not be parking there- mostly teachers and hospital personnel. Stay tuned.

Our Time Press will follow this story. – BGreen

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