GUILTY OH - Asteve'e 'Cookie' Thomas, 12, shot to death, Cleveland, 1 Sept 2007

Dark Knight

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An Ohio newspaper has apologized after running an editorial cartoon that seemed to make fun of a 12-year-old girl shot dead in Cleveland last week.

The Cleveland Plain Dealer made the apology in Friday's edition after it ran a cartoon by Jeff Darcy that showed a little girl running from a convenience store wearing a T-shirt that said "Don't Shoot: I'm a friend of a friend of a friend of Mayor Jackson's daughter."

On Sept. 1, Asteve'e "Cookie" Thomas was killed when she was caught in the crossfire of a gunbattle as she left a corner store. Her mother is a friend of Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson and high school classmate of the mayor's daughter.

Jackson, fighting criticism that he has taken a low-profile during a recent surge in homicides, went to the Slavic Village neighborhood where Cookie was shot to embrace the victim's mother this week.

"I think they're making fun of the death of my daughter," her mother, Karen Elliott, told MyFOXCleveland.com. "They're taking stabs at Frank Jackson, but my daughter was not a politician, she was a little girl."

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,296042,00.html
 
uh oh someone is in trouble. well they should be anyways.
 
Geez, just because he's a mayor he's not allowed to comfort his friends? To politicize the murder of a 12 year old child like this is plain sick. They'd better freaking apologize! :slap:
 
This is terrible. They should be ashamed of themselves for running that cartoon.
 
Most people that live in Cleveland have had it with Mayor Jackson. As sad as it is, the cartoon is true. I'm sorry they used this little girl as the victim in the cartoon, as they could have used any of the almost 100 murder victims from just 2007 (so far).

Yet when relatives of Mayor Jackson commit a crime, it's swept under the table. He won't talk to the community about this or any of the issues we face, unless it's something good for public relations. He needs to get more police on the streets, and they should concentrate on the east side, where crime is unbelievable!

It's really that simple. The bad guys need to know they aren't in charge anymore.

RIP, Cookie.
 
Although I agree with all of that, TM, they should have been smarter than to mock the killing of a child. No matter what Jackson does or does not do, when 12 years olds are getting shot to death on your streets that's where the outrage should lie... and whether you blame the mayor for this or not, it is in very bad taste to use a 12 year olds violent death for a political cartoon.

I totally agree with the little girl's mom:

"I think they're making fun of the death of my daughter," her mother, Karen Elliott, told MyFOXCleveland.com. "They're taking stabs at Frank Jackson, but my daughter was not a politician, she was a little girl."


That's where the emphasis should lie. All IMHO of course.
 
Yikes! Talk about bad editorial judgment.
 
The newspaper has gone downhill too! I wrote them last year because they printed a picture from the movie "Saw" on the same page as the comic strips. The picture was of a woman bound, gagged and hanging from the ceiling by her hands. :eek: My son likes to read some of the comics, but he didn't get them that day!

I'm normally very optimistic, but this city is sliding downhill fast. The crime rate, politics, schools... :razz:

This little girl's death has to help change things for the better. It was a totally senseless crime. Two men with guns shooting at each other in broad daylight like they were on the set of "High Noon". Cookie was just coming back from the corner store with some candy.

Perhaps the cartoon will help the Mayor realize the seriousness of our problems if that cartoon blunder brings some national attention to our problems.
 
From January 2010:

http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2010/01/22-year-old_cleveland_man_who.html

James Yhonquea, 22, of Cleveland, was sentenced Tuesday to 23 years to life in prison for killing 12-year-old Asteve “Cookie” Thomas during a shoot-out with another man...

Yhonquea shot Cookie Sept. 1, 2007, in Slavic Village, after Eric “Big Willie” Wilson, 38, shot Yhonquea in the back. Yhonquea spun around and fired, striking the young athlete and honor student instead of Wilson...

Wilson put Cookie’s family through a trial, and got 28 years to life for the shooting. Yhonquea pleaded guilty Dec. 16 to aggravated murder, partly to spare the family another trial, his attorney, Thomas Rein said.
 

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