Call on community to stop gun violence

DAYTON, Ohio (WDTN) - Dayton Police are investigating four shootings in less than a week, three of those were deadly.

27-year-old Jillian Miles will never be able to hug her two young children ever again after Dayton Police say she was shot twice inside a home on West Parkwood Drive Tuesday night.

Less than 24 hours later, 95-year-old Oscar Beason was found with multiple gunshot wounds inside his Dayton home on Hochwalt Avenue Wednesday afternoon.

And then, Friday afternoon, 28-year-old Willie Boddie Jr. was shot three times while sitting in a car at H & H Service Center and Car Wash on West Riverview Avenue .

All three victims of gun violence.

"It saddens me because one of the things I understand about these shootings is the streets won't die for us so why are we so willing to die for the streets?"asks Marlon Shackelford.

Shackelford is trying to stop it with the Community Initiative to Reduce Gun Violence .

" We work with about 140 men who we would like to say are ex-felons or most of them are ex-felons.  What we try to do is get in their head.  We try to say that the most powerful weapon you have is This is a billboard in your mind and you control what happens to you," he explains.

And he says if you're not apart of the solution, then you're apart of the problem.

"See something, say something, do something  because do is critical.  The community has to heal from the inside out.  We can't keep waiting.  You can't put it all on the police.  you can't keep putting it all on ministers.  You can't put it all on the schools.  Everybody in the community needs to take an opportunity to make a difference," he says.

You can help police, if you have information on any of these recent shootings, call Crime Stoppers at 222-7867.