Phase One, Pow­der Mag­a­zine De­vel­op­ment in Co­corite has al­ways been a qui­et com­mu­ni­ty, but fol­low­ing Sat­ur­day’s mass shoot­ing, res­i­dents fear the area will nev­er be the same again. 

In fact, some res­i­dents are ready to leave the com­mu­ni­ty for good, as the haunt­ing sight of bul­let-rid­dled bod­ies piled one on top of the oth­er re­mains in the minds of res­i­dents, as do the ear-drum-pierc­ing sounds of the bul­lets and ac­com­pa­ny­ing screams of ter­ror.

The pres­ence of a po­lice post in the com­mu­ni­ty brings a greater sense of se­cu­ri­ty, res­i­dents said yes­ter­day, two days af­ter the dead­ly in­ci­dent. But they are fear­ful that gun­men may re­turn to claim more lives. This is de­spite two men be­ing ar­rest­ed in con­nec­tion with the shoot­ing on Sun­day night.

Bev­er­ly, whose name has been changed, is trau­ma­tised and wor­ried. 

Her son was one of the twelve men shot on Sat­ur­day evening. He was shot in the leg and was one of the eight to sur­vive the shoot­ing.

“It sound­ed like the end of fire­works when you set off a whole set of fire­works at the same time. That’s how it sound­ed. I see some fel­las run­ning around, and I say, wait, that looks like my son. By the time I reached down­stairs, he was ly­ing down by two ve­hi­cles there. His right leg, one bul­let—clos­er to shin; bawl­ing,” she said. 

She ad­mit­ted she is among those con­sid­er­ing leav­ing the com­mu­ni­ty. 

Bev­er­ly is yet to re­turn to work and, as a re­sult, has no mon­ey to buy food. Bev­er­ly’s stom­ach was emp­ty, and her heart was heavy. She ad­mit­ted that she saw the car with the gun­men en­ter the com­pound, but did not think much of it. 

“I was watch­ing the car and won­der­ing why the car was so dark. The tint was very dark. It re­versed and drove back out very slow­ly. It was very cal­cu­lat­ed. It wasn’t like they rushed in and rushed back out. It looked like they were look­ing for some­body,” she said.

While Bev­er­ly wor­ried about her wound­ed son, her heart went out to the oth­er moth­ers whose sons did not sur­vive the hail of bul­lets. 

“Every­body I was watch­ing on the ground, I know—body up­on bod­ies. Bod­ies on top of bod­ies, like out of a movie. Du­ane, Shak, Dri­ver, Jack, and Miles, are on top of one an­oth­er. And those peo­ple re­spon­si­ble just drove out of here nor­mal, nor­mal. Oth­er peo­ple came out­side to see their fam­i­ly mem­bers, their hus­bands, and their sons. The com­mu­ni­ty could nev­er be the same af­ter this. I see a lot of peo­ple jump­ing in ve­hi­cles with their fam­i­lies and leav­ing.

“The most hor­ri­ble thing I ever saw, and it’s some­thing I could nev­er for­get. You see what peo­ple see in the video? That is a joke. When I walked up on the block and saw it, it was some­thing dif­fer­ent,” she said.

An­oth­er res­i­dent, a young man lim­ing on the block, mere me­tres from where the mas­sacre took place, said the young men, and just about every­one in the area is feel­ing “shaky”.

He said un­like oth­er com­mu­ni­ties con­sid­ered hotspots, the Phase One Pow­der Mag­a­zine com­mu­ni­ty is not ac­cus­tomed to fa­tal shoot­ings, es­pe­cial­ly mass shoot­ings.

He ad­mit­ted that peo­ple are deeply con­cerned that an­oth­er shoot­ing may take place when the po­lice post leaves.

“They are there try­ing to make peo­ple safe, but how long are they go­ing to do that for? But af­ter they are gone, what are the peo­ple from here po­si­tion?” The man in his 30s asked.

“Since Sat­ur­day night, that hap­pened, and peo­ple are still wash­ing away blood,” he added. 

A shop own­er, who lives less than 30 feet from the crime scene, called the shoot­ing mad­ness.

“It’s go­ing to hap­pen again, and it might hap­pen worse be­cause the next frus­trat­ed youth is go­ing to pick up a ma­chine gun,” he said.