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A Mom's Call To Action

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By SARAH HOYE | The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 3, 2007

TAMPA - No one warns you in advance about the day your life is going to fall apart.

Until that moment, everything appears in order, even unmemorable at times. Brushing your teeth, buying a gift for your sister, watching a football game.

Then the unthinkable happens.

For Darla Saunders, that day was Super Bowl Sunday 2005. As she and the rest of her family were watching the New England Patriots and Philadelphia Eagles battle it out on TV at their Ybor City home, they were unaware that her son had been found dead early that morning in a vacant lot. The night before, Saunders' son, 18-year-old Isaiah "Iceman" Brooks, stepped out with his friends. Responsible and well-mannered, Isaiah had the trust of his parents and was allowed to go.

By the time New England's victory hit the nightly news, Isaiah was still not home. Saunders says she and her husband, Elliott, figured he was "trying to be grown," pushing his limits as a young adult.

On Monday morning they found Isaiah's bed empty, making it clear he never made it in another night. Assuming things were fine and that he was with friends, they decided to deal with him later that evening.

After work, Saunders, who still hadn't heard from Isaiah, received a disturbing call from an anonymous man saying her son was dead.

Panicked, she called the police to report her son missing.

Not long afterward, a neighborhood beat officer arrived at the house. Saunders handed him a photo of her husky, 6-foot-7-inch son. The couple identified his body at the morgue on Tuesday.

While the family slept Sunday morning, Feb. 6, Isaiah was shot in the back of the head and robbed. His body was dumped near 19th Street and Nebraska Avenue, only blocks from their home.

In an instant, life as Darla Saunders knew it changed forever.

"We never had any trouble with Isaiah," she says. "He was a positive person who found good in everyone. He's how I used to be."

Once trusting and selfless, Saunders said she turned cynical and cautious. The mother of two other children — ages 22 and 9 — became afraid to answer the front door and would constantly lock her car doors or write down license plate numbers of suspicious vehicles. Finally, the family moved to Riverview, to "safety."

Nearly three years after the shooting, the case remains unsolved. Tampa police will not comment on their investigation.

Rather than wait for answers, Saunders is doing what she can to keep her son's case active and help other victims' families find justice. In late 2005, she and Elliott founded Advocates for Safer Communities.

"The reason I chose to do something is that I don't want anyone else to go through what we did," she says. "It really destroyed me. … As a mother, it feels like every part of me has been taken away."

The Saunders' goal is to decrease violence and create a support network for victims' families.

The five-member, volunteer board, which Saunders heads, meets once a month at the Children's Board of Hillsborough County on Palm Street in Ybor City. The group is looking to take the meetings online to better accommodate participants.

"Not everyone is at the same place," she says. "Some people are hurting so bad that they can't get their lives on track yet."

On Saturday, they plan to walk door-to-door around Tampa Park Apartments in Ybor City with information about unsolved cases and to share community resources for children and families. A meeting with neighborhood associations, to tell them about the group and ask for help to "break the code of silence" surrounding crimes, is in the works. They are organizing a fundraiser for later this year and are applying for grants to increase programming.

The modest Saunderses — Darla is a secretary for the Hillsborough County Public Schools system, and Elliott is an operator at Wheelabrator Technologies waste management company — pay most of the group's expenses themselves.

Police Ask For Help

In September, Saunders, 45, stood in a West Tampa vacant lot before a small audience of friends and relatives of murder victims whose cases also are unresolved.

Wearing a T-shirt bearing photos of victims' faces arranged like a page in a high school yearbook, she methodically read a list of the names, a bead of sweat rolling down her cheek.

"The last place your parents want to see you is the funeral home," Elliott Saunders, 44, wearing a T-shirt that matched his wife's, told the group, sitting in folding chairs. "Parents, know who your children's friends are and where they're going."

Tampa Police Chief Stephen Hogue and a number of detectives also attended the rally, and they urged the community to work with law enforcement and provide a forum for mourning families to speak out.

"We expect to work hard, but we need your help," Hogue said, referring to the unsolved cases under investigation or classified as cold. "Somebody out there knows something, and we need to get to that person."

Police say crime decreases with help from the community and cite a study that shows a 9.4 percent decrease in Tampa's crime rate from 2002 through 2006. They welcome help from groups such as Advocates for Safer Communities.

"There are very few crimes where there are no witnesses, and without those accounts and support, it's tough," says Andrea Davis, assistant spokeswoman for the Tampa Police Department. "You need those people who were around to speak for the victim."

The Saunderses speak to youth church groups and juvenile offenders and work in tandem with police and homicide detectives. They sponsored bus stop benches lacquered with victims' faces and a phone number for anyone with information regarding their cases.

"Yes, I can do something to help others. I can't bring him [Isaiah] back, but I can get out there and hopefully reach some of these youth," Saunders says. "I can make sure someone else doesn't have to go through this."

'A Look That I Can't Shake'

Killings and unsolved murder cases are nothing new, Saunders says. The difference comes when people such as Vivian Heyward choose to do something about it.

Heyward has hosted an annual vigil for murder victims for 11 years, a tradition she started following the murder of her friend's son behind a tavern in East Tampa.

Years of watching Tampa violence take lives took its toll on Heyward, and she is ready to let the Saunderses take the lead.

In 2006, Tampa had 25 murders. There have been 24 in 2007 as of Oct. 22, according to Tampa police. There are 295 unsolved homicide cases dating to 1949. Unincorporated Hillsborough County had 35 homicides in 2006, compared to 44 as of Oct. 22, with a total of 181 unsolved homicides.

Heyward met Saunders at one of her vigils, and they have stayed in touch.

"I am so proud of them. As a whole [community], we need to do a better job than what we've been doing," Heyward says. "But the numbers keep growing, and it's not going away. I have to watch these mother's faces, and they have a look that I can't shake. It's sad."

It's hurting parents, crippled by anger and sadness over the death of a child, and the fed-up friends and neighbors, who Saunders wants to console and unify despite her own struggle with losing Isaiah.

"I'm doing as good as I can. I get rewarded by talking to the youth and doing what I do," she says.

The advocacy group not only has a growing presence in the community but has also allowed the family to heal, says Frank Reddick, a family friend and adviser to the organization.

"It's given her [Darla] an outlet to be motivated and more involved instead of being concerned with who killed her son," says Reddick, president of the Sickle Cell Association of Hillsborough County. "This is not about one family; it's about many families, and they are providing hope."

Saunders is slowly picking up the pieces, trying to move forward in life; keeping the faith that she can inspire young people to make good choices and find justice among the killings.

"I can't worry about what I can't control," she says, adding that she believes her son is looking down on them. "My closure is going to come."

Today, she feverishly organizes community events and darts between meetings with community leaders and work and shuttling the family to appointments.

She also visits her son's gravesite weekly, regardless of the difficulty around holidays or his birthday. He would have turned 20 last Tuesday.

Still, no matter how packed her schedule is or how much she fantasizes about the day her son's killer is caught, someone will always be missing, and his name is Isaiah.

"The community has a responsibility to come forward," she says. "If they kill mine today, they can kill yours tomorrow."

Researcher Melanie Coon contributed to this report. Reporter Sarah Hoye can be reached at (813) 259-7832 or shoye@tampatrib.com.

Keyword: Advocates, for video about living among the killings.

HOW TO HELP

If you would like to donate to Advocates for Safer Communities Inc., or for more information on upcoming events and how to volunteer, go to www.adv4sc.com. If you have information regarding the murder of Isaiah Brooks or any other victim, call the Tampa Police Department Homicide Division at (813) 276-3554.

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