Family copes with death of 3-year-old girl
Brooklyn Harris recalled as happy, smiling baby
Brooklyn Harris didn’t cry much. She didn’t get into things she shouldn’t.
She played with her dolls and brightened up rooms. Her grandma called her “Smiley.”
“She was just a happy little baby,” said Lasangna Marie Ferguson-Fields, Brooklyn’s grandmother.
The 3-year-old girl was shot and killed in what police believe to be a road rage incident Saturday morning. The shooting occurred near North 42nd Street and West Townsend Avenue after Brooklyn’s mother drove away from a curb. A man in a black SUV shattered the back windshield with bullets, striking Brooklyn in the head.
She was transported to Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin for treatment, where she was pronounced dead shortly after the incident. Her father, Shawndell Harris, visited Brooklyn in the hospital.
“I couldn’t see my child like that,” Harris said.
Now the family is dealing with the unthinkable — funeral arrangements for a 3-year-old and explaining her death to her siblings.
“Right now, it’s still unbelievable,” Ferguson-Fields said. “I keep saying that she’s not gone.”
Brooklyn was in the car with three other children, ages 1, 2 and 4, when the shooting occurred.
Ferguson-Fields said Brooklyn’s 4year-old sister was sitting next to her. She is struggling to process what she saw, the grandmother said.
“She’s thinking that her sister’s at the doctor’s office, she just hasn’t come home yet,” Ferguson-Fields said. “We have to get this little girl some sort of counseling.”
Reggie Moore, director of the city’s Office of Violence Prevention, said one of his priorities is “ensuring that children who have been exposed to a traumatic event are surrounded with love and patience and compassion ... immediately after the event and also on an ongoing basis.”
The office’s counseling services are provided through the county’s Children’s Mobile Crisis Team, which has two full-time counselors. The counselors can provide up to six free sessions of support for children affected by traumatic events.
Ferguson-Fields said Brooklyn’s mother is “in the state of mind that she can’t talk right now.”
Camille Mays, founder of Peace Garden Project MKE, said it is important for the community to rally around the family with support and resources.
“So many people outpour to the family initially when it happens,” Mays said. “But after ... they have needs and healing and trauma that they’ve experienced that they need to cope with.”
It can be hard to address emotional distress immediately after a homicide. Family members are often forced to focus on the vigil, autopsy, funeral services and any expenses they may face.
“You’re driving in the morning, and then that night you’re having a vigil for your baby,” Mays said.
Ferguson-Fields said New Pitts Mortuary on Capitol Drive offered free funeral services. The funeral will be Tuesday, Shawndell Harris said.
“It’s hard for us to believe that she’s gone,” Ferguson-Fields said. “It maybe won’t hit us until we get to the funeral.”
For now, the grandmother is urging community members to contact police to mediate issues rather than using a gun to solve it themselves. She said they need to “think before they do stuff.”
“We just have memories to go by and try to keep her smile living inside of us,” Ferguson-Fields said.
Shawndell Harris said he feels sorry he couldn’t protect his daughter.
“I always told my kids I would be there so nothing happened to them,” he said. “It’s going to take a long time to get through this one.”
“I know my baby is in heaven right now,” Harris said. “It’s not safe down here for nobody.”