Letter | Horry County violence: We’ve lost far too many young people recently

As I sat in my home office recently, a call came in.

“We lost another one,” a crying voice on the other end of the line said.

It was a terrifying call concerning a tragic killing in the Racepath Community near Myrtle Beach, another homicide of an ever-growing list of young people shot down in the prime of their lives. The person shot was a Good Samaritan, a young woman trying to break-up a fight, only to be killed in the prime of her life.

With a heavy heart and after hanging up the phone, it rang again. And again the person on the other end was sobbing.

“Mr. Bennie, we have another killing.”

Oh heaven, how can this be? When is this insanity going to stop?

Yes, we lost another one. Once again a call brought terrifying news concerning another death. A young man 28 years of age suffered death at the hands of a home invader in Loris.

There must be programs set up - immediately - to build up confidence in our young people, informing them we want to help and support them. We can do this by having after school activities, community centers that can be beacons for entertainment, sports, jobs training, a police athletic league, hiring intervention team workers, as well as recruiting retired professionals to use their expertise to help.

The focus must be centered on prevention, intervention, and where needed, suppression. To support my concerns, here are a few more statistics that are shocking:

There has been, according to Horry County Councilman Marion Foxworth, five dead in his district this year. In the Longs-Little River area in Horry County, there have been eight deaths since February.

When do we say that enough is, in fact, enough?

Several years ago many, joined mothers of slain youth, and myself and others, in our call to break the silence and provide the supports to end the violence.

Pleas sipport our faith leaders and mothers and others to stop the silence, along with Mothers against Violence.

Yes, I urge The Sun News editorial board to stand with me and other citizens pleading for a call for action.

We can’t sit on our hands and not demand action from our appointed leaders and the media - especially our county and local legislators.

We need to work together. I suggest that a sensible start is what I proposed above.

As we summon our elected officials once again to please not turn their backs to this ongoing crisis, again I urge our editorial board to stand with our citizens as we call for action.

How can we sit down and not demand action from our legislators to find solutions to difficult problems like basic protection?

Legislators run for elected office to solve problems. Most of our elected representatives are good people elected to office and charged with ensuring safety and improved quality of life, not only for Memorial Day, but every day.

Surely we recognize officials cannot legislate hope or morality. However, they can provide legislation to provide services that can generate opportunities that provide hope and purpose to the lives of our young.

In far too many cases, our children live for today with no dreams or aspirations for tomorrow. More than likely, many youth and adult residents who live with this daily violence have been traumatized and suffer from the mental health issue referred to as PTSD, or post traumatic stress disorder.

In the absence of treatment, this disease will follow them for the rest of their lives and future generations to come.

Let’s help them. Now.

The writer is a community activist in Myrtle Beach and plans the annual Martin Luther King Jr. breakfast.

This story was originally published May 11, 2015 at 1:52 PM with the headline "Letter | Horry County violence: We’ve lost far too many young people recently."