By Tammy Mutasa

BEDFORD-STUYVESANT– Steven Hill, 15, loved by many and cherished for his vivacity, lay peacefully in his ash-gray, pin-striped suit which matched his ash-gray casket. He appeared to have the peace in his death that he did not have when he was alive. Hill’s right hand had been delicately placed on top of his left hand to conceal one of the several bullet wounds that contributed to his murder on September 10, 2009.

“He was my baby boy,” his father, Larnell Hill said in the lobby of the funeral home; he could not bear to stay in the room with Steven’s casket. “When I was growing up parents were not supposed to bury their children. Nowadays, that’s just the name of the game.”

Today the name of the game is murder, according to police, community members and the Kings County District Attorney’s office, and Bedford-Stuyvesant is a neighborhood where it too often rears its head. Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brownsville and East York had the highest homicide rates in Brooklyn last year. Murders are down by an average of 10 percent from last year, according to the 79^th and 81^st precinct statistics, but that’s little comfort to the friends and family of the 28 people who have been murdered in Bedford-Stuyvansant streets.  So far this year, more murders have happened here than anywhere else in  Brooklyn.

Bedford-Stuyvesant’s teenagers have been particularly hard hit.  Youth murder rates here are more than twice as high as in other neighborhoods in the city.  And that’s saying something potent in a city where homicide is the leading cause of death for teenagers between 15 and 19, according to the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene. In Bedford Stuyvesant, 49 youth lose their lives to murder per 100,000 compared to 20 per 100,000 in other neighborhoods.

Police blame an aggressive gang culture and the proliferation of guns. Clergy and community organizations such as the Bed-Stuy Safety Task Force blame cyclical social patterns of poverty and lack of opportunities for teenagers.

The Kings County District Attorney’s office is aggressively working with both groups to try to crack down on violence. Part of the plan is to hold more gun buyback programs which enable people to turn in their guns for cash. The police have also ramped up patrols around the neighborhood.

“It’s all these guns on the streets, and we have no idea where these guns are coming from, if we knew we would not have this problem,” said a police source in the 81^st precinct who did not want to use his name. “We’re aggressively trying to find the people who are dealing these weapons.” (good that you got this)

But people living on Steven Hill’s street say the police need to try harder. (good transition) For Steven Hill, it all ended on September 10, 2009. According to police, Hill was one of three teenagers sprayed with a barrage of about 20 bullets in a drive-by shooting just before 6 p.m.. just outside Hill’s apartment stoop on 217 Bainbridge Street.

“I hear shots like that all the time, but these ones were really close,” Joann Hill, Steven Hill’s mother said pointing out the second story window in their apartment. “Then I hear someone calling ‘ma, ma’ and my husband heard it. It was Steven.”

The Hills say by the time they got outside to the stoop, a pool of blood circled Steven from multiple gunshot wounds. Not too far from their son, 20 year-old Antoine Stokes was struck and killed with at least eight bullets. The third teenager Derrick Henry, 16, barely survived, police said.

“I held him in my arms and I thought the only place he was shot was his hand,” Steven’s father said. “But then he was also shot near his heart and by the time we got to the hospital, I knew it was too late.”

Three months later, no one has been arrested for the murder and the bullet holes are still indented in the metal doorframes and white walls of the apartment building’s entrance. For neighbors like Tony Grant, 52, who’ve lived on Bainbridge Street for decades, it hurts every time he sees them.

“It’s painful, it’s very painful,” Grant said, counting up to 12 holes. “[Steven] was taking out the garbage and [Antoine] was just eating his Chinese food right here, then this happened, it’s not fair, everybody loved those kids.”

According to police, the murder was no accident. The gunmen had specifically targeted Steven Hill and his friends because they associated with a rival “group” the gunmen had a beef with, but Hill’s father says his son was an ace student and wasn’t up to trouble.

In Bed-Stuy, Steven Hill’s Street is one street behind Chauncey Street—an infamous alleyway, known as “Smurf Village,—that connects two housing projects: The Brevoort Houses and the Fulton Park Plaza Houses.

According to Grant, ever since he was young, the Brevoort Houses have been home to the Blood gang and Smurf Village has been home to the Blood gang’s biggest rival, the Crip gang.  Police believe the gunmen hailed from the Brevoort Houses and drove down Bainbridge when they spotted Steven.

“Steven wasn’t with the Crips, he just hung out with them to fit in,” Grant said, walking around the eerily quiet housing complex of the Brevoort Houses just after nightfall. “He was a good kid, a jokester, but he was just a follower.”

The problem with kids following gangs in Bed-Stuy is nothing new. But, the board for Community District 3 reports that within the last two years there has been a rise in gang recruitment and “turf” battles all over the neighborhood, including Chauncey Street.

Grant, also known as the “Mayor of Bainbridge Street” knows this all too well. He says a problem area is, “The Colosium”—a basketball court surrounded by bleachers in semi circle shape at the Brevoort Houses.

“They deal drugs here, they bet on basketball games,” Grant said pointing towards two young men playing basketball in the pitch dark. “See them over there? They can’t play in the day time or they might get shot, so they do it in the dark because you can’t see them. It’s dangerous here.” (great quote)

Reverend Robert Jackson, a former social worker for 27 years and current Youth and Family Service Committee member for Councilwoman Annette Robinson, says gang culture, gun proliferation and violence are just by-products of a social system that has disproportionately failed black youth in predominately black neighborhoods like Bed-Stuy. For example, he points to the information from the New York City Department of Education that only 56 percent of black students graduate from high school compared to75 and 78 percent of their white or Asian counterparts respectively. (I rounded up the numbers)

“They don’t see success in front of them, they’re not getting jobs. They’re fighting poverty, they don’t have a lot of parenting because parents are working even two jobs.” Jackson said. “So they attach themselves to gangs to fill that void.”

Jackson says as a result of these tough social conditions, black youth have become immune to violence when it happens. Just ask 18-year-old Ronald Polite.

“I’m numb,” Polite said. “There are certain things that shouldn’t be normal but are normal now.”

But numerous organizations are now fighting back and hoping to give the youth in Bedford-Stuyvesant a chance. Like the Project Regeneration’s Foot Soldiers. The Foot Soldiers are a youth organization created to help teenagers in Bed-Stuy beat the system of idleness, lack of education, violence, and crime. They do anything from cleaning the streets for pay, to resume¢ writing workshops. Polite joined the group three years ago, after he got beaten up.

“I feel like I owe them so much, I can’t even pay them back for what they’ve done for me,” said Polite, who lives on the infamous Chauncey Street and walks 30 minutes to the group’s headquarters everyday just to participate. “People don’t have anything positive to do around here and [it’s] is one place you can fill your time with something positive.”

But for the Hill family, filling their time is painful. Three months later, the Hills say no matter what happened with Steven, the permanent absence of their last born child will never be replaced.

“He is always on my mind,” his mother said looking at the front door. “I still wait for him to come through the door from school, but he doesn’t.”