ALEXANDRIA, Louisiana — ALEXANDRIA, Louisiana (AP) —
Alfred King lay in the parking lot of a small apartment building, fatally injured when police in Alexandria, Louisiana, arrived at the intersection of 12th and Magnolia Streets shortly before 1:30 a.m. on January 20.
The 34-year-old was the first fatal shooting of the year in the small town where I grew up and where much of my family lives.
Alfred's death was similar to those I have described since my first one in 1985, a 38-year period during which hundreds of thousands of people of all races and ethnicities died violently in the US.
I know the details of too many of those incidents, from school shootings to a drug bust in a phone booth. I have heard the scream of a mother coming home from work to see her son on the street, surrounded by yellow police tape. I have seen more than one mother gently touch her teenage son's face and then close the lid of the casket.
Some stories are burned into the memory, like the Washington DC teenager who asked his mother to send him out of the region to escape the violence. He spent years away, but came home one weekend to plan his high school graduation party and was randomly stabbed to death by a stranger.
While I know some of those backstories, Alfred's is the one I can personally relate to, from a decision made years ago by adults to gunshots at the end of a run-down street.
Alfred is my first cousin.
When he was thirteen, my wife and I tried to get custody of him after his mother was murdered, but his guardian said no.
I often think about him and the decision that kept him from achieving escape velocity, the things you need to get right to lift the burden of your birth circumstances. These include family, education, jobs, friends, neighborhoods, adult interventions, hard work, and good luck.
We say that people can be whatever they want to be. To some extent that is true, but moving through the socio-economic levels of America's economics-based caste system is akin to the Apollo moon missions of my youth. Millions of parts have to work perfectly to get you there and back.
According to “Race and Economic Opportunity in the United States: An Intergenerational Perspective,” part of the groundbreaking Opportunity Insights project at Harvard, only 2.5% of black children born to a parent or parents in the bottom quintile move to the top quintile. the family income. For white children this is 10.6%. What is more likely for both is that they will remain in the poorest quintile or, at best, move up one level into the lower middle class. For white children that figure is 53.4% and for black children: 75.4%.
The emphasis in statistics tends to be on racial inequality. I see the inequality, but what I also see is that, black or white, less than half of the children born into poverty make it much higher. Even if they take just one step, a car repair, a missed day of work or a high energy bill can cause a downward spiral.
And millions of people are born into that world, even though we treat it as a moral failure. Census data shows that more than 10.7 million children under the age of 18 were living below the poverty line in 2022, and that figure is undoubtedly higher because millions more lived in places where incomes could not be determined.
Millions of young people live in homes where Social Security benefits, WIC, SNAP and TANF, various food, nutrition and income assistance programs are commonplace.
Poverty is not the domain of one race. Nor is it a violent death. Socioeconomics is a good predictor of victimization and criminal justice involvement, as well as poor health and education outcomes.
Alfred was born on the bottom economic rung of the world, and when he was 13, the crucial decision was made that likely kept him there. His mother had been shot to death in Alexandria months earlier. My uncle, his father, had done what he could, but could no longer work hard jobs, usually several at a time, and lived on a limited income himself. He could not promise his son much of a future.
The first time I met him, Alfred was a thin, lanky, very shy boy who kept his head down and avoided eye contact. He spoke softly and slowly and was the target of bullies.
I don't remember him laughing – ever. At least around me his nature was melancholy.
To Alfred, I was the cousin who lived a charmed life. The truth is, for reasons I will never understand, almost everything went well.
We like to talk about people who pull themselves up by their bootstraps. Many people contributed to my boots and showed me how to use the straps. There were teachers, friends, family, neighbors and happiness together. That mix was added to the foundation: an unmarried ninth-grade mother who really valued education and married a good man who helped her raise me.
Alfred's grades weren't good. Something about the way he looked at me made me wonder when the last time he had an eye exam was. One visit to the optometrist and glasses later, he could see the blackboard.
My wife and I then decided. We wanted to bring him back to Maryland, where we live. We wanted legal custody so my work benefits could cover him. We also wanted to be able to make decisions on his behalf without unforeseen bureaucratic or legal obstacles.
My now deceased uncle said yes, but his message to me was that Alfred's now deceased grandmother said no. Alfred got some kind of check from the government. I don't know how much it paid or what program it was. This year I asked the Social Security Administration what it could have been and there were a few possibilities. As a minor, he could have been eligible for benefits because of his deceased mother. It could also have been Supplemental Security Income for some health problem he had.
In a country where the minimum wage at the time was $5.15 an hour and people were living on the brink of financial ruin, it didn't matter how much or for what. When you're born into a certain economic class, everything goes to the basics: food, rent, utilities, clothing.
Alfred remained in Louisiana.
Over the years he reached adulthood and when I came home I would give him whatever money I had, especially if he had children of his own. By then he had a criminal record, but he treated me the same way and he controlled my mother – Aunt Shirley.
I cannot and do not want to judge the decision made for the 13 year old. Unfortunately, I understand the need for it. But I wonder what would have happened if we had caught him. I can't say for sure that everything would have been fine, but I believe we could have given him more options on a different path. What I want to remember is that changing his path would also have changed the lives of anyone he may have wronged.
There are abandoned houses and empty lots in the area where he lived and died. I've been there several times this year.
I saw some young children there, born into circumstances they didn't ask for, living lives with no room for mistakes or bad luck. I pray that all goes well for them and the millions of children like them, regardless of race or ethnicity, and that they achieve escape velocity.
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Gary Fields, an award-winning veteran journalist, writes about democracy for The Associated Press.