Three days after 7-month-old Kaori Patterson-Moore was shot and killed, her family remembered her during a vigil as a baby that was always happy and smiling.
A letter written by the baby’s father, Jamari Patterson, read to a crowd in Williamsburg, Brooklyn said in part, “Seeing her for the first time. I knew she was special. I wanted to spend my entire life being her father.”
“We are hurt. We have anger. Our family is broken. I am broken,” Arlene Poitier, Patterson-Moore’s great-grandmother said at the vigil.
Police say Patterson-Moore was the unintended victim of a gang-related shooting. For people who live in the neighborhood and for her family, the pain of it all is still fresh.
“She was always smiling. Always happy. Always a beautiful spirit,” said Christina Poitier, the baby’s grandmother.
Kaori Patterson-Moore died at a hospital about an hour after she was shot in the head, sources told NBC New York
Patterson-Moore’s grandmother’s chose to remember the positive qualities that the child offered to the world in her short seven months on Earth. Her laugh, her smile, and her blooming, joyful personality.
“She was beautiful and she did not have a chance. I have to hear my grandson ask ‘what did she do that someone would do this?'” Poitier told attendees.
Why the shooting happened is a question that investigators are working to answer.
On Friday, police announced the arrest of 18-year-old Matthew Rodriguez in Pennsylvania. Police say he’s the man seen on surveillance video driving the moped that 21-year-old suspect Amuri Greene was riding on when he allegedly fired at least two shots that struck Patterson-Moore and grazed her two-year-old brother.
Greene was arrested and charged with murder and attempted murder after he was injured in a crash as both men fled the scene Wednesday afternoon.
“She was a child. A baby in a world that should have wrapped itself around her with protection,” said Bishop Gerald Seabrook, who heads United Clergy Coalition.
Nearby at Humboldt and Moore streets, where the tragedy unfolded, leaders like Attorney General Letitia James (D-New York) and New York City Public Advocate Jumaane Williams stood with the baby’s family and the community, calling for solutions so young people will put the guns down.
“I want the message to go out clearly and loudly,” said James. “The gun violence is unacceptable. We will get out of it and we will stand together.”
One of Kaori’s grandmothers made an impassioned plea to the city and state to pour resources into society’s young people, so they have activities, along with positive community influences and mentors.
