No arrests have been reported, but police said last night they had extra officers placed in the city's West Ward to avoid further violence.
TRENTON — Tiara Green’s adult life was just taking shape.
The 19-year-old had graduated from the Rubino Academy this month and had been accepted into cosmetology school. She was planning on attending classes starting this fall, following in her aunt’s footsteps to become a beautician.
Next Saturday, her family had planned a graduation party.
“She was like a typical teenage girl,” family friend Monifa Banks-Harrison said of the girl who loved shopping and fashion. “If you took her and put her anywhere else in the country, she’s a typical teenage girl.”
But Tiara Green’s dreams are no more, after a bullet from a drive-by shooting behind a city apartment building late Saturday ended her life.
Green was among three people shot during an assault by gunmen on a small group of people gathered behind the high-rise. It began with the drive-by, then started again when the suspects parked and walked back to let loose another round of gunfire, Lt. Mark Kieffer said yesterday.
A woman and young child walk behind Rowan Towers in Trenton Sunday morning. Police said 19-year-old Trenton woman Tiara Green was fatally shot behind the high-rise late Saturday night. Motive was unclear in the attack behind Rowan Towers on the 600 block of West State Street late Saturday night. Police have not said who they believe the target in the shooting was, but Green’s family believes the teen who they say loved to have a good time with her friends was an innocent bystander.
“This is a good person who happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time,” Banks-Harrison said.
The shooting happened at 11:22 p.m. in Gilbert Alley, which runs behind Rowan Towers, Mercer County First Assistant Prosecutor Angelo Onofri said. Green was shot once in the stomach, while another young woman was hit once in the back. Green was rushed to Capital Health Regional Medical Center, where she died during surgery early yesterday, Onofri said.
The woman shot in the back also was rushed to the hospital in “extremely critical” condition. While law enforcement authorities believed she would survive, the woman was still in “very critical” condition at Capital Health last night, according to hospital staff.
A man with the two women was shot in the buttocks. He was treated at the hospital and expected to survive.
While no arrests have been reported, police last night were taking extra measures to stop possible retaliatory attacks. Extra officers, hired on an overtime basis with funds from grant money, were staffing a task force in two spots in the West Ward, police said.
While a task force on Stuyvesant Avenue had been pre-planned, another in the area of Spring, Passaic and Calhoun streets was ordered as a direct response to the homicide, Sgt. Leonard Sutton said. Just a few hours into the effort, at least three arrests had been made, he said.
Factions of armed men potentially centered around drug crews at Rowan Towers and on Hermitage Avenue have traded gunfire with a group in the Sanhican Drive and Edgemere Avenue area for nearly 18 months. Less than two weeks ago, a shooting on Sanhican left three people wounded, including a 15-year-old girl.
Green’s death is the city’s 17th killing of 2013. The 16th death was Rayshawn Ransom, also 19, who died this weekend after being shot on Passaic Street. Several graffiti tags near Murray Street and Hermitage Avenue, which border Rowan Towers, appeared to memorialize Ransom. “RIP Ray,” one read, “Juice Gang.” It’s unclear whether the most recent homicide is connected to Ransom’s death.
In 2005, the year of a record-setting 31 homicides, the city did not reach its 17th murder until Aug. 28.
Green’s family says they want the people who committed the homicide brought to justice, Banks-Harrison said. They want to know who snuffed out the flame of a young woman she described as “a fireball.”
“She was definitely not shy about letting you know if you are on the right side or the wrong side of justice,” Banks-Harrison said.
Green’s mother Tia has already seen a sister murdered, a brother die from AIDS, and another brother drown in a city canal in late 2008. Now, Tia Green has lost a daughter barely into adulthood to the punishing reality of Trenton’s streets.
“This is too much,” Banks-Harrison said. “This is too, too much happening in this city.”
Anyone with information on the case should call police at (609) 989-4170, or the Confidential Tip Line at 989-3663.
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