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Campus Mourns Death of Delaware State Shooting Victim

By Shauntel Lowe
Black College Wire

Tragedy struck again at Delaware State University this week when a student died as a result of her injuries from a Sept. 21 campus shooting that has raised concerns about campus security and culture clashes among students.

Provided by Delaware State University Shalita Middleton

Shalita Middleton, a 17-year-old freshman biology major and cheerleader at DSU, died on Oct. 23. She was shot twice just before 1 a.m. near the campus Village Cafe. She had been in Christiana Hospital in Delaware since the shooting.

Middleton's family released a statement after her death, saying, "At approximately 3:30 p.m. today, Shalita K. Middleton passed from this world into God's arms. She struggled valiantly over the last several weeks and she was an inspiration to all of her friends both in Washington, D.C. and in Delaware, as well as her family members, especially her mother Lavita and her father Tom. Ultimately, however, the internal injuries that she suffered were in the end too critical to overcome."

The other Sept. 21 victim, Nathaniel Pugh, also a 17-year-old DSU student, was shot in the ankle and has since been released from the hospital.

Three days after the shooting, Loyer Braden, an 18-year-old DSU student from New Jersey, was arrested in his dorm room in connection with the shootings. He has been charged with attempted murder, assault, reckless endangerment and possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony.

Braden's lawyer, James Liguori, said he did not know if the charges against his client would change in light of Middleton's death, but Braden was "saddened by the loss of a fellow classmate and anxiously hoping that he can get his day in court to prove to anyone that he didn't have anything to do with this."

News of the death brought another wave of sadness over the Dover campus, as many had been holding onto hope for the freshman's recovery through prayers and the creation of several Facebook groups monitoring her progress.

"Whether we knew her or not, we are all saddened by her death because she is part of the Delaware State University family. We are saddened over her death and angry that this even happened on our campus," said university spokesperson Carlos Holmes.

The DSU community has been at the center of two major violent incidents in the past few months that have attracted international media attention. In addition to the Sept. 21 shootings, three DSU students were killed execution-style and a fourth was injured in a school parking lot in Newark, N.J., in August.

Thomas Peterson, a lifelong friend of Middleton and sophomore computer engineering student at Johnson C. Smith University in Charlotte, N.C., created the Facebook group "RIP Shalita aka Cookie" in tribute to the young woman with whom he grew up. He attended eighth grade prom and high school in Washington, D.C., with Middleton.

"I knew her basically my whole life. She was a good friend. She was happy. She was always joyful," he said.

Peterson said "Cookie" was the name given to Middleton by the cheerleading squad at their high school in Washington. Word of the shooting at DSU shocked him. "It just emphasized that you can go at any time. She was one of the people who wasn't into all that violence. She never hurt nobody," he said.

The violence inspired DSU sophomore accounting student Janay Wilson to create the Facebook group "RIP Shalita/ The Violence Will Stop." Though Wilson said she did not know Middleton, the shooting, and now the death, of the cheerleader and the Newark killings pushed her to "do something" about the violence.

Some have said that a prevalent tension between New Jersey and D.C. students may have been behind the Sept. 21 shootings. Braden, the alleged shooter, is from New Jersey and Middleton and Pugh, the victims, are from Washington, D.C.

A New Jersey native herself, Wilson said cultural tensions between people from Washington, D.C. and New Jersey have caused problems on campus, including conflicts among the women in the freshman class..

"Everybody is afraid of change, of being different. D.C. is different from New Jersey. Our music is different. A lot of people from New Jersey listen to Baltimore Club music. People from D.C. listen to go-go," she said.

Wilson said people who respond violently to "something little" like a different taste in music or other cultural differences are "slaves in their own minds."

"A lot of African Americans get mad when people put stereotypes on them, but when they live up to the stereotypes, they leave them no choice. They can't complain," she said.

Wilson said she is not afraid on campus because of her faith in God and noted that there has been increased security since the shootings. At a homecoming party the week prior to Middleton's death, there were metal detectors, which Wilson said she had not seen before on campus, and police officers walking through the crowd.

Holmes, DSU spokesperson, said increased patrols on campus since the shootings are intended to provide peace of mind, not because the administration felt its prior security arrangements were inadequate. "What happened on our campus could happen on any campus. It was not a case of a breach of security. It was a case of where a student made a bad decision...a very tragic choice in choosing that gun to deal with an issue he had with someone else," he said.

The violence has caused sophomore nursing student Ty Davis to reconsider her decision to attend DSU.

Davis, who is from Newark, N.J. where three DSU students were killed and a fourth was injured in August, said she came to Delaware State to be around people who were serious about their education, not to be around shootings that also happen in students' hometowns.

"I don't see Delaware State as a university where you can get a higher education," she said.

Davis said although the university is on its "Ps and Qs" now, security issues should have been addressed long ago, such as insufficient ID checks to enter the campus, a sentiment echoed by Wilson and previously mentioned by former student Chris Stevens immediately after the shootings.

Davis said a lack of social activities on campus has also contributed to "beef" among students. At this point, she said there is nothing the university can do to stop her from moving on to William Paterson University in Wayne, N.J. Holmes, however, insists that the university is safe even though there were shootings on the campus.

"I don't think we're any more or less vulnerable to this type of thing than any other college or university. Any student that would use this as a reason to leave has to understand the same possibility would exist at that university as well," he said.

The alleged Sept. 21 shooter, Braden, is being held in jail on $192,000 bond. The bail was increased from $92,000 after Middleton died. Braden's lawyer, Liguori, said the judge wanted to set bail at $500,000, but Liguori argued the amount down.

Liguori said the arrest of Braden was a "rush to judgment" by DSU police pressured to come up with a suspect to calm the campus, invoking the popular saying "fools rush in where angels fear to tread." Holmes said university police have turned the investigation over to the attorney general's office. The attorney general's office spokesperson could not be reached for comment.

As the investigation continues, the university will also continue to deal with its tragedies by preparing for future emergencies and helping the student body cope with the loss.

Holmes said the university is currently in contract talks with an outside company to institute a campus text message alert system. He said the alert system was planned for prior to the shootings.

A Candlelight March was planned for Oct. 25 between the Martin Luther King Student Center and the crime scene on campus, pending weather conditions. The funeral for Middleton is scheduled for Oct. 30 at noon at Nineteenth Street Baptist Church in Washington, D.C., with a viewing to be held from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m.

Shauntel Lowe is a 2006 Black College wire intern and a recent graduate of UCLA.. To comment, please e-mail .

Posted Oct. 26, 2007