A fund has been set up for expenses for a baby killed in a drive-by shooting Sunday night in Kansas City, Kan.
The Go Fund Me web page for 7-month-old JaQuail Mansaw, shot by a drive-by shooter while inside his home with his mother, is at www.gofundme.com/jpxnpk.
Tamika Pledger, who brought the funding need to the media’s attention, said that the site was set up by the family for burial and other expenses.
There are many questions about the case at this point, and early this morning, police appealed for the public to call the TIPS hotline at 816-474-TIPS and provide information that would lead to the arrest of those who are involved.
There was another shooting in the same block, the 2700 block of North Early, on April 5, 2014, which injured a man in his 30s and a juvenile, according to a police spokesman in April. Police stated they are not ruling out any connection between the cases. The location of the shootings is not far from 8th and Quindaro.
Pledger said that the community and state need to get serious about stricter gun laws and stricter rental licensing laws that would help curtail gun and drug activity.
“When violence hits, it hits the whole community,” she said.
Pledger said she believes the drive-by shooting Sunday night had nothing to do with the family who lives at the home with their five children.
Pledger said kids need a safe living environment. On New Year’s Eve, people were driving around shooting guns into the air, she said.
“Parents have to sleep with one eye open,” Pledger said. “As soon as we hear gunshots, we’re on the ground. People shouldn’t have to live like that.”
In her experience, she said she has noticed that people are coming into the neighborhoods from other neighborhoods in the county. In most drive-by cases, however, there is some connection between the location of the shooting and the shooter, perhaps an earlier argument, she said.