Ten-year-old Shyian Thompson is comforted after writing on an impromptu memorial for Lecent Ross who was killed on Thursday.J.P. MOCZULSKI/The Globe and Mail
Those mourning 14-year-old Lecent Ross say they know what they want done in her memory: a crackdown on the illegal trade of guns across the border.
To her volleyball coach, Lecent will always be the girl whose persistence was tempered by her politeness. She nagged Nigel Barriffe to schedule extra practices before the championship, he said. After concluding that Greenholme Junior Middle School's sound system, and therefore its dances, were subpar compared with other schools, the Grade 8 student organized a petition.
That determination was one reason he made Lecent team captain, said Mr. Barriffe, who teaches special ed at the school.
A single bullet struck Lecent in the head Thursday morning at a friend's house on her street in north Etobicoke. Police haven't said who they believe was holding the gun at the time, or whether she was shot accidentally.
"I just want to make sure that Torontonians understand that this is a tragedy," Mr. Barriffe said. "This is a beautiful young girl, and we've lost her. Rexdale always keeps getting known for negative things, and it's like, no, this was a really good girl and she was raised properly and now she's lost."
He and Lecent's family said Friday they'd like her death to inspire Torontonians and those in power to commit to reversing what they called a growing acceptance of illegal guns in Canada.
The gun was a short-barrelled, semi-automatic .40 Smith & Wesson that was illegally obtained, said Detective Rich Petrie of the Toronto Police Service.
Mr. Barriffe grew up in Rexdale, and only for children born in the past two decades or so do guns "seem to be more of a reality," he said. Lecent's death was a reminder of what that can mean, especially for children living in neighbourhoods plagued by more gang activity, he said.
"What's unfortunate here [is] if this happened in Rosedale or in Forest Hill, there would be no question about the fact that she would not [choose to] be near a gun," said Mr. Barriffe. "I'm telling you as her teacher that she would never be near a gun."
He said he felt helpless to prevent similar incidents without a much bigger effort and new funding for border security.
"I really want our government to take this seriously, the way we take terrorism seriously," he said. "We need to make a commitment at the federal level that we will no longer allow guns to come across our borders, full stop. It needs to be an election issue."
Lecent's uncle, Troy Amos Ross, said Friday he also wanted a federal anti-gun push in her name. "The government knows exactly why these guns are on the street, and they should not be on the streets," he said. "And it has to take a life now for us to get on board."
Lecent's mother went to the coroner Friday to identify her daughter's body, and for most of the day she was too upset to speak with the media. One thing that has helped, she said in the late afternoon, was hearing from neighbours she barely knew who were grieving for her daughter.
"They're like yes, she was a very bright girl," said Alicia Jasquith. "We just moved around here – how does everybody know her already? She's very special."
She asked fellow parents in Toronto to turn in guns to the police, or to call in tips about them.
"I don't understand why this could have happened to her. I need answers myself," she said. "We have to put our foot down in the neighbourhood and community. We see something, tell it to someone."
Gun crime in Toronto is up significantly this year over last year so far, with an increase of 57 per cent in shootings causing injury or death and double the number of shootings without injury, according to the Toronto Police Service.
Police are testing the gun involved in Lecent's death to see whether it's been used in any other incidents, Det. Petrie said.