North Philadelphia 4
Braiheen Jamison, 22, home health aide who wanted to marry fiancee ‘and have 10 kids’
It was the spring of 2011, and Braiheen Jamison was preparing to start his new life. A recent graduate of Glenn Mills High School, Braiheen had a job interview lined up and was expecting a baby boy with his fiancee, Kenya. “They wanted to get married and have 10 kids,” says his mother, Wendy Jamison. […]
Michael Strong, 21, would give the shirt off his own back, or even a TV
If a friend needed something and Michael Strong Jr. could provide it, he’d do so happily. When he was in high school, Michael’s friends would converge on their home in North Philadelphia after his mother, Sylvia Murray, left for work, and Michael would make breakfast for everyone using food from Sylvia’s last grocery haul. Sometimes […]
Samir “Saddi” Fortune, 18, an underground rapper who dreamed of stardom
Samir Fortune, who was called Saddi, always wore earbuds or headphones around his neck. The high school senior loved listening to Meek Mill, and that led to him to try writing hip-hop music himself. When Samir first started out, his mother was skeptical. “I didn’t believe in him at first,” Tahira Fortune said as she […]
Martin Alicea, 29, a family man who had coffee with his mother every morning
Every morning, Luis Martin Alicea would go to his parents’ house for coffee. He loved how his mother Elsa made it, his cousin Jessie Alejandro-Cruz said. Now, Elsa has continued this tradition, but in a different way. Martin, a talented baseball player, music producer and father of five, had just gotten a haircut on the […]
Subscribe to our newsletter
Follow us on Facebook
Most viewed
Neighborhoods
Every month, we create a placeholder webpage for each person murdered in Philadelphia. Our hope is to elevate these pages into fully written stories with photos that show who each victim was as a person. Through storytelling, we're shining a light on the human toll of gun violence in Philadelphia.