We’ve all seen the headlines — Darius Miles, a member of the Alabama basketball team, was one of two people charged Jan. 15 with capital murder in the shooting death of 23-year-old Jamea Jonae Harris. He has been dismissed from the team, not that such an action means much in light of the death. Court documents indicate that Miles supplied the gun but was not the shooter.
Everyone is paying attention to this because such a high-profile person is involved, but let’s not forget there have been four homicides in Tuscaloosa County in one week. Two men from the Montgomery area were killed and dumped near Fosters on Jan 8. Another man was shot and killed Jan. 14 at Sun Valley Apartments in Tuscaloosa.
No matter who did the killing, there are now four people who have been slain in a single violent week. We don’t have a great many details on any of these killings since they have only recently occurred, and we won’t have much until the cases are tried, so the innocence or guilt of those charged in the crimes remains in question.
After having photographed Miles for a couple of years on the Alabama basketball team, I can tell you I was fairly shocked when I heard that he had been charged with capital murder. I have photographed him many times and he always seems to be smiling. Not exactly the mental image one has of a killer.
I have no knowledge of the other suspects and certainly no photos of them, especially before the homicides took place, just as I have no picture that shows Miles off the court. Once in a while, a high-profile individual is charged in a homicide, and we are all shocked. The sad fact of the matter is that we have a problem with violent crime in our country, but, unless the perpetrator or the victim is someone of note, we mostly just pass over the crimes in silence.
I think since coming here in 2015, Tuscaloosa County has averaged between 15 and 20 homicides every year. None of them are good, but so often they occur in a minority community or among people no one in the general population knows. The deaths are easy to ignore.
This one won’t be because a University of Alabama athlete is involved in some fashion. Ignoring deaths does the victims and their families a disservice. I wish I could go deep inside each event and put the pain of loss the family members feel right in front of your eyes so that the real impact of murder would move you to action.
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I’m not actually sure how much of that I could take. The emotional impact would probably do me in pretty quickly. But because we can simply ignore these deaths or pass them off as meaning nothing to us because it didn’t happen to us or to our family ensures that all this violence will continue unabated.
I grew up in a rural community in north Alabama and everyone knew everyone else. It was a small population group, so violent crime was a rarity to begin with, but in that small community there was a sense of family. Having such a sense of family does two things. First, it ensures that people are involved with the lives of those around them, which can act as a damper on violent emotions. Second, there is an accountability that community brings because you are going to have to look everyone in the eye after you have done something stupid. That tends to help keep stupid in check.
The sense of family, of community, also helps people deal with their anger without hurting anyone for the same reasons listed above. If you are prone to domestic violence and your spouse shows up at the grocery store with a black eye, there won’t be any doubt who did it to them. Having a sense of community doesn’t stop violence, but it does help curtail it, and it certainly adds to the accountability after the fact.
What is happening more and more often in communities large and small is that we have abandoned the things that tie us to one another and provide accountability. We have lower church attendance now than at any time in my lifetime. Our families are more scattered than they have ever been. We are more isolated from one another due to the electronic age and, as a result, we are less and less likely to have the influence to stop things from escalating out of control. And we have a media culture of violence that is staggering in both its breadth and its depth from television, movies, music and video games.
There is a big part of me that hopes Miles is innocent, that he had nothing to do with this, but there is a woman who is now dead who should still be living. More than anything else, whoever is guilty, I hope they are held accountable for the sake of the dead and for the sake of those who mourn her.
Gary Cosby Jr. is the photo editor of The Tuscaloosa News. Readers can email him at gary.cosby@tuscaloosanews.com.
