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Lee Cooper

No doubt...........
RACIST.......
Sincerely,
Lee
wrote in message
oups.com...
On Jun 28, 10:36 pm, Anonymous Sender
wrote:
don't most humans finish the first grade at age 6?

Family members recall happy, helpful first-grader
By Jessica Heslam, Michele McPhee and Laurel J. Sweet
Tuesday, June 26, 2007 - Updated: 10:33 AM EST

Born into a troubled Dorchester family rife with gangbangers and marred
by violence, 8-year-old Laquarrie "Cory" Jefferson was a shining star of
hope until his life was snuffed out with a single bullet inside his
Dorchester home Sunday night.

"He was just a beautiful little boy. He was so smart and he was so
intelligent," his cousin, Daisy Jefferson, said through tears. "He's been
through so much. He didn't even have a chance."

A bright boy and protective big brother even at the tender age of 8,
LaQuarrie was shot dead just three days after he finished first grade at
Dorchester's John P. Holland Elementary School.

"He had a beautiful smile and he had a good sense of humor," said his
great-aunt, Melody Cooper of Roxbury. "He was a happy little boy."

The slain boy, who turned 8 in March, recently told his great-aunt
Johnniemae Jefferson of Dorchester that he'd be glad to turn 18. "I
started laughing because he just turned 8 - then he didn't even make it
through his eighth year," Jefferson said. "He didn't deserve to die."

Johnniemae Jefferson said the family is so devastated and shocked
that they can't eat. "He was a fun little boy," Jefferson said. "He was
street wise and school smart, too."

Laquarrie's father is Liquarry Jefferson, 27, who served time for the
1997 stabbing death of a homeless man and is behind bars for a series of
2004 armed robberies. His mother, Lakeisha Gadson, 30, has a history of
assaults and robberies.

"He was like a brother," said his 9-year-old cousin, Daija Jefferson,
who also went to the Holland school. "He was fun. We played
hide-and-go-seek. We used to go outside and play tag."

Laquarrie had a "big brother" in the Massachusetts Big Brothers
program, relatives said.

Every morning, Laquarrie would clutch his little sister's hand
protectively as he waited outside his home at 266 Seaver St. for the bus
that would take her to preschool at Lena Park, a community-group center.
Yesterday, the bus pulled up in front but didn't find LaQuarrie, or his
3-year-old sister Fashiyra, waiting for the bus.

When the bus driver called the children's social worker, Nia Sue
Mitchum, she was gripped with anxiety. "He was such an all-around sweet,
sweet boy," said Mitchum, who worked with LaQuarrie in the Lena Park
after-school program. The youngster, she said, was an engaging, bright
child who was eager to learn and create with art and music.

"I'm devastated," she said.

Before school got out for the summer, Laquarrie and other students
wrote essays on what peace meant to them. The essays were hung up to form
a peace train, which stretched through the school's corridors.

"He was such a nice little boy. Anyone would have been proud to have
him as a son," said Holland Principal Michele O'Connell. "He was good to
his classmates, helpful to other students. Just an innocent boy."
[continue]http://news.bostonherald.com/localRegional/view.bg?articleid=1008306

Shucks, another potential Rhodes scholar snuffed out in the prime.

greg

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