Man slain near Perkins, Staring
A 30-year-old man was shot and killed Sunday afternoon outside his apartment in the Cedar Lake subdivision near Perkins Road and Staring Lane.
Earl Brown was shot at about 3:15 p.m. in the parking lot outside the brick apartment at 1633 Cedar Lake Drive he shared with his longtime girlfriend and 1-year-old son, family members said.
Just as police pulled up to the parking lot where Brown’s body lay, the sky opened up with intense lightning and torrential rain, destroying some of the crime-scene evidence.
As the wind and thunder raged, police struggled to secure the area surrounding Brown’s body that lay on a grassy area next to the parking lot.
“The rain could have washed away different pieces of evidence, such as shell casings, fingerprints, DNA,” District Attorney Hillar Moore III said.
Police did not release a motive or suspect in the slaying.
Both of Brown’s parents are deceased, so his girlfriend’s family was the only family he had, said Sonja Young, Brown’s girlfriend’s aunt.
Young said Brown and her niece had met in school in New Orleans and had been together for at least eight years.
“It’s so sad,” said Young. “Just when you think it’ll never happen to you, it will. He’s gone now. He’s gonna be missed.”
Brown liked to rap and used the rapper name “Mosquito,” or “Skeet” for short, said Rolonda Cornish, 15, his girlfriend’s cousin.
“He joked the (‘Mosquito’ nickname) was because he bites you real fast,” she said. “He was funny. He called me Snuffaluffagus and would make up beats and raps about me all the time.”
Cornish said Brown had brought her to a water park two weeks ago, and he had taught her how to drive.
Particularly in light of the destroyed evidence, Moore said he hoped witnesses and people with information would report to authorities what they know.
“Somebody knows who killed this person right now,” he said. “The vast majority of people in the neighborhood knows who killed him. We just need them to come forward.”