On the night of August 13th, the familiar sound of gun fire could be heard around midnight near East 38th Street and East Roosevelt Avenue. When the gunfire stopped, five people had been shot. One, 26-year-old Antoine Jamir Holmes was dead when authorities arrived. Another, 19-year-old Rigoberto Villagomez-Dillon would die later at St. Joseph’s hospital. Two teenage girls and one woman were also treated with non-life-threatening injuries.
Antoine and Rigoberto are the sixteenth and seventeenth Tacoma homicides this year. I was not able to find much information about either individual nor was I able to find out details about the shooting. This is due to a combination of factors. Some people do not have much of an online presence. Since there has been no arrest in this case, there are no charging documents detailing the event. And sadly, when it’s a shooting on Tacoma’s East Side, the media tends to treat it as unimportant and spend little time focusing on it.
This shooting was part of an increase in gang violence in recent months. There was at least one additional shooting that left a person paralyzed in what is thought to be retaliation for this shooting. It’s easy for some to dismiss gang violence as something that is far removed from their lives, but the truth is that our connection to gang violence is far closer than we might think.
While I cannot say much about the victims, I can say that they have family and friends who will never be the same in the wake of these killings. What is a forgotten headline in last summer’s newspaper will remain a life altering event in the lives of some.
As always the comments section is reserved for those who knew the victims and want to share thoughts or memories of them.
– Jack
tacomastories.com 