DAYTON — Two grandmothers are speaking out after their grandson became one of the city’s most recent victims of homicide.
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News Center 7’s Mike Campbell talks to the women, who are no strangers to devastating tragedy and losing their loved ones, LIVE on News Center 7 at 6:00.
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Eric Middlebrook, 24, was killed in a shooting around 10 p.m. on Kammer and Shoop avenues on Sunday night.
They hope Dayton police can track down the people responsible for their 24-year-old grandson’s death.
“It is completely senseless because these young boys. They don’t care,” Joanne Middlebrook Allen said.
Middlebrook Allen and Michelle Harris said they both received calls saying something had happened to Eric on Kammer Avenue.
They said he didn’t carry a gun and believe someone ambushed him.
“Just to kill him. Why come, you can’t be a man and fight him one-on-one. Why did you have to get a gun and kill my child?” Middlebrook Allen said.
“I’m so tired, my heart is tired, my mind is tired, I done lost so many,” Harris said.
Harris has spoken with News Center 7 before.
Her daughter, Nischelle Harris, died in flooding from Hurricane Ian a few years ago.
Her death came a couple of years after Harris lost her son, Brandon Harris, in a homicide at Rick’s Jazz Club off Germantown Avenue.
“I lost my son to violence, and I lost two grandsons to violence. They got to stop, they got to put these guns down, these kids don’t value a life,” Harris said.
These women are united by tragedy, loss, and unexplained violence.
Middlebrook Allen lost another grandchild, Aria Middlebrook, to gun violence a few years ago in Riverside.
“Y’all got to put the guns down, they gotta put them down. I’m angry, I’m so angry right now,” Harris said.
Detectives are following leads, looking for the shooter who took Eric Middlebrook’s life.
His grandmothers believe every death due to gun violence is not just a homicide but a robbery.
It robs the victim’s family and the community of that person’s talents and future accomplishments.
News Center 7 will continue to follow this story.
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