These folks use to be our neighbors. Now they fill our phone, tablet and computer screens everyday in no particular order. And yet they form one steady rhythm: people choosing harm, again and again, in the space of ordinary days. And this past 10 days was A LOT.
Start with D4vd, David Anthony Burke, twenty one, the singer whose voice once wrapped around millions of listeners like a bruise they wanted to feel. The BBC headline I read was clear: US singer pleads not guilty to murder in the death of a missing teen girl. Next to it, a photo of fourteen year old Celeste Rivas Hernandez, curls framing a soft smile, cross necklace resting against her chest. Her remains, severed head, torso, limbs, turned up last September inside a Tesla tied to him. Prosecutors say the abuse had gone on, she threatened to expose it and ruin his rising career, so he killed her, dismembered her, and tried to hide what was left. He walked into court this week and entered not guilty pleas to first degree murder with special circumstances, continuous sexual abuse of a child, and mutilation of human remains. And while his music keeps streaming, I can’t imagine where the evidence (this girl’s remains) are stored in bags that once crawled with insects. Crazy thing is how he went from unlikely superstar who’s energy found an audience, to a martyr who will sit in PC, (solitary confinement) until this case is resolved one way or the other.
Then the political portrait. A Congresswoman, Rep. Sheila Cherfilus McCormick, D Fla., stands at a podium in front of the nation’s Capitol, there to represent the people. But instead, she’s facing the allegations of yet another Covid scam. Well, she resigned Tuesday, April 21, 2026, minutes before the House Ethics Committee could vote on her expulsion. Federal charges already loom: she stands accused of stealing roughly five million dollars in COVID relief funds meant for disaster victims and diverting some into her own campaign. That polished presence of her in a navy blazer, arms crossed in front of American and Florida flags, is likely the version she wanted the world to remember. But that suit is likely going to be switched-out for an orange jumpsuit that reads BOP in bold black letters. Shame on her. And I bet she thought she was doing something: “I’mma quit before they fire me. Make sure history knows it was MY CHOICE. Lady sid’down. You bout to meet the jailerman. And apparently, you need the attorneys, the courtroom and the TV cameras to fully expose the rest. SMH.
These mugshots tho! They sometimes tell a whole story! The tatts climbing his neck, the dark hair slicked back, and already guilty-by-appearance in the jail jumpsuit. It’s the same cycle, y’all. But this shh right here? I’m thinking when they dragged him out of the house they didn’t want to give him time to “lemme git my shit, maan!?” That, and is this a bullet-proof vest they threw on him? I mean, justly so! You took a do-right woman from society, Sir! Alanda Cuffee and James Pelzer were apparently sharing the same house… the same kitchen in Pensacola, Florida. The story goes, “he tried to squeeze past her.” But then she said, almost lightly, that he could “at least say ‘excuse me.’” I guess that was the trigger, because word has it he walked to the bedroom, returned with a black shotgun, and fired four or five times in front of her mother. She died on the tile floor. He now sits in Escambia County Jail facing second degree murder charges. Eight quiet words met with buckshot. This was obviously bigger than him not saying excuse me, and a deeper issue that we will likely all see play out in court and on the evening news… But for me, I tend to look at these things, a little deeper. I can take in the smell from the kitchen, that small house where these grown adults apparently didn’t get along. That, or the evil that consumed James had reached it’s tipping point. Where and how could anyone have identified his mental illness and dis-ease? And who would think that the worst might come to fruition? How many hoes right now are filled with people who do not like one another? How many of them are pressure cookers? Sheesh. Its something extreme when all of the evidence points to one person who decided to alter reality… his own, and someone else’s. And what must he be thinking right now as he mulls over those two cold pancakes and Styrofoam cup of tart, black coffee? Is he thinking about the death penalty? Is he thinking about his new life, and new cellmates and new realities that will now carry on though the rest of his living years? Is he considering all the other options he had other than the holes he put in this woman? In front of her momma? This nigga here. SMH. And I hate to hop around, but y’all, do you have choices that can change your life and then you have consequences that you’re left with. And fifty eight year old Chadwick Scott Willacy swallowed some heavy consequences the other evening at at Florida State Prison. Chadwick is…, well, WAS an older Black man in a green vest, g’raying beard, eyes carrying decades of weight.
Another frame holds Chadwick Scott Willacy, . Tuesday evening , they strapped him down and ran the three drug protocol. Thirty six years earlier he had broken into neighbor Marlys Sather’s home, beaten her, bound her, poured gasoline over her while she was still breathing, and set her on fire. She died from the burns and smoke. Before the drugs took hold, he told the others on death row to stay strong and offered the victim’s family thin words about peace, then insisted he never killed his friend. He died still claiming innocence. The state called it justice delivered. The family received no clean ending, only the close of one long chapter of pain. It’s really hard for me to tell what’s going on with his story. Of course he’s been on death row for a long time and he’s embraced innocence and so you can talk yourself into believing something for sure. What is certainly doesn’t leave a window open of possibility and it leaves a question mark In your mind, asking: “hey, did this guy just get executed accidentally?”
Grainy surveillance stills fshow this woman in a black shirt, striped purse across her body, arm extended, evolver aimed at the clerk behind the counter of a Shell station in Columbia, Maryland. She fired once, point blank. Turned and walked out without touching the register. The clerk survived but carries wounds that will stay with him forever. Police identified her as Shantay Lashay O’Donnell, forty six, from Virginia. She is already in custody on other charges and will face multiple counts here. Most likely attempted murder. But I am clear that the world is a better place with her off the streets for the rest of her life.
And then this: A father driving to pick up his seven year old daughter from after school care never made it. Darian Ragland, thirty nine, was on Branch Avenue near the D.C. Maryland line in Temple Hills when another driver, angry that Ragland would not let him merge, pulled alongside and opened fire. Ragland died at the scene. Thirty three year old Polo Shaw now faces first and second degree murder charges. One man on his way to his little girl. Another man deciding a lane change was worth ending a life. Road rage turned fatal in the time it takes to change lanes. You can quote me on this: people are crazy. If that’s you, stay the fuck away from me! Excuse my perfect English.
By now, this Shreveport, Louisiana stoy must’ve kicked you in the gut, especially if you’re a mother. The violence that turned inward and swallowed a family whole was ruthless. Thirty one year old Shamar Elkins opened fire in a domestic explosion, killing eight children, seven of them his own, plus a young cousin. A ninth child survived by jumping from a roof. Two women, including the children’s mother and another girlfriend, were gravely wounded. Elkins died in a confrontation with police. The community still walks around in shock, trying to find language for eight small bodies taken in one morning inside the place that should have kept them safest. But again, how to forecast incidents like this? Well, in this case, there were some issues early on; his mom is said to have abused drugs which lead to abandon, then there was a first-offense DWI. Not headline material on its own, and still wouldn’t that be offset by this cat’s military service? He served in the Louisiana National Guard from 2013 to 2020. That’s routine. That’s discipline. That doesn’t immediately say go home and shoot up the family. So then where do we start with mental health? It’s hard to call this one quite frankly. I can’t blame it on his collar. I can’t blame it on him being aimless he was definitely Social if you’re counting all the kids, there’s gotta be some kind of romance and love in his life. So by all accounts, including sociologists, psychologists, social workers armchair theoreticians like myself, we are truly lost for words. This is a tragedy on another level from another galaxy. It’s one of those tragedies that has you asking “is there a God?”
And while I’m going off, why don’t we cross the ocean to Zanzibar, Tanzania, where influencer Ashlee Jenae, thirty one, real name Ashly Robinson, was celebrating her birthday and a fresh proposal from her fiancé. She was found unresponsive in a luxury villa after an argument. Actually, upon more digging, I found that it was more than just one argument, and that they had been arguing all week and possibly this has been going on for as long as I’ve known one another. So this is toxic from the router to the tutor. Number two., I’m finding out that this mofo is broker than your uncles broke down, civic sitting in the driveway for the last seven years. His company is upside down, now, Ashley is more or less introducing him to the good life, which is it just between her legs, but also an introduction to her audience that follows her on a global scale. Authorities first called it suicide by hanging. Her family and many watching from afar demand clearer answers. The fiancé remains under scrutiny, passport held. A dream trip meant for joy ended in a morgue with questions that refuse to settle. What can we address the elephant in the room, and speak to the discourse going on between him and the family? Wouldn’t you as this woman’s lover want to console and communicate with the family in these hours after her passing? Or perhaps the blame is all on your shoulders and you just can’t handle the truth. And now you have the whole world, so to speak, on your shoulders and they’re not letting up. Everybody and their mama is an Internet investigator right now. Driving there. Telescope up your butt. Story developing on that one, but while we are overseas, WTF London!?
In London’s Soho, outside a nightclub, two influencers argue over a man. One, former X Factor contestant Gabrielle Carrington, traded blows with rival Klaudia Glam, Klaudia Zakrzewska. Then Carrington climbs into her black Mercedes, and basically weaponizes the vehicle, (I told y’all to stop doing this shit) accelerating and plunging the popular hood ornament into Klaudia, running her over with some different luxury branding. Then she reversed over her body, and struck two bystanders. Klaudia did not survive. The video circulates raw and unrelenting. One moment of jealousy, one foot pressed hard on the gas, and lives erased or forever altered.
And now… In Flint, Michigan, James Shirah and Savanah Collier said “I do.” Hours later he argued with his groomsman Terry Taylor, got behind the wheel of an SUV, (yeah, we go again!) and deliberately ran him down. Taylor died on the pavement. Shirah pleaded no contest to second degree murder. His bride pleaded guilty to accessory after the fact. A wedding night meant for dancing became a homicide scene. What in the flyin fcuk is in Flint’s water?
All of this unfolded across just a couple weeks, and even as I’m writing this, there’s at least 20 more incidents that are piling up in front of me .
But look at us: A singer silencing a child to protect his image. A congresswoman stepping away before accountability could land for millions in stolen relief funds. A stepfather answering a mild request for basic courtesy with a shotgun. A father shot dead on the way to pick up his daughter because another driver wanted a lane. Eight children slaughtered in their own home. An influencer dead on her birthday trip amid unresolved questions. Another influencer run over twice outside a nightclub. A groom killing his groomsman on his wedding night. A woman calmly shooting a gas station clerk for pocket change that never left the drawer. A man executed after thirty six years for burning his neighbor alive.
This is not scattered noise or random tragedy. It is the daily machinery of human beings deciding another person’s life is expendable, for pride, for money, for silence, for a lane change, for nothing that holds up under the light. For sure, not Gods glow. The content machines keep feeding it to us, turning pain into scrolls and clicks. The rest of us keep moving through our own ordinary moments, (I just sang that John Legend line out loud to keep my sanity) carrying the small fractures each story leaves behind.
These fractures do not close on their own. They widen when we treat every fresh horror like just another post to swipe past. Somewhere tonight another kitchen holds tension, another road holds two drivers inches from rage, another argument simmers near a weapon or a steering wheel. The thread does not break. It only lengthens unless we decide, in our own tight spaces, that the line between irritation and irreversible violence is worth guarding with everything we still have left. But I still gotta ask what the fuck is going on with us? Is this simply how life is, rolling dice every waking moment of our lives?
Look at the images again. Really look. Then ask yourself what you will do when the next one appears in your feed. Because it will. Today. Tomorrow. And the day after. The question is no longer whether we see it. The question is whether we let it keep happening without choosing something different inside ourselves while there is still time. Or else we just ride this mofo until the wheels fall off, with a huge WTF printed on our T-shirts, our hoodies, or BRANDON on our brains.
All of these people, every face… are apart of our one fractured Family album.