Family Of Grandmother Killed In Shooting Speaks Out
MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- The family of a Minneapolis grandmother who was shot and killed while driving her minivan Thursday evening says enough is enough.
Birdell Beeks' children are speaking out about senseless gun violence on Minneapolis streets.
Birdell, 58, was driving with her granddaughter around 6 p.m. Thursday when she became caught in the middle of gunfire near Penn and 21st Avenues North.
Police say Birdell was an innocent bystander.
Birdell's daughter Sa'Lesha Beeks has many fond memories of her mother.
"She would open up her house for anybody, cook, everybody knew to come to her house if you wanted a meal," Sa'Lesha said.
Birdell's two daughters, nieces and nephew said she was always taking care of everyone else, even as she was fighting for her own life.
"She was a rock of this family," Birdell's nephew and former Minneapolis police officer Anthijuan Beeks, Sr. said.
Birdell survived kidney failure, diabetes and was in the middle of battling colon cancer when a stranger and a stray bullet killed her.
"Anger, confusion, why won't they just put the guns down?" Sa'Lesha said. "Our city is going to hell."
Her family says Birdell was driving her granddaughter to get a summer job application on Thursday night, when they neared Penn and 21st Avenues North.
"They were coming up to the stop sign, and [Birdell's granddaughter] actually seen the guy on the hill with the gun," Sa'Lesha said.
Sa'Lesha says her 16-year-old daughter yelled for her grandmother to back up, but there was a car behind them.
"The last words that she heard my mom say was, 'Baby, they got me,'" Sa'Lesha said.
Birdell is the 10th Minneapolis murder victim since the start of the year, but dozens of others have been shot inside the city.
"Stop being cowards out here," Sa'Lesha said. "If you were big enough to pick up that gun and decide that you were going to go outside and put innocent people in the way of your anger, stand up, be a man and turn yourself in."
The Beeks family knows this tragedy is bigger than them and bigger than anger.
"These kids have nothing to do, we have got to give these children something to do because they are lost," Sa'Lesha said.
The Beeks family is planning a memorial vigil for their mother for later this week.
They want city lawmakers to put more money into education and school programs, which they hope will be part of a long-term solution to curb violence.
The Minneapolis Police Department is investigating what led up to the gunfire in the area where Birdell was killed and say it may have been gang related.
Police said they made several arrests near the scene of the crime shortly after it occurred Thursday night.
It is unclear if police got the person they believe is responsible for Birdell's murder.
Minneapolis police chief Janee Harteau released a statement on Friday calling the death of an innocent bystander "intolerable and unacceptable."
Harteau said 12 new officers will be added to the 4th Precinct, which covers the area where this crime happened, on June 12.
