[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 145 (1999), Part 17]
[Senate]
[Pages 24553-24554]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



                          VIOLENCE IN MICHIGAN

 Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, this week, students at Erickson 
Elementary School and Willow Run High School are mourning the deaths of 
their peers. On Sunday afternoon, gun fire cut short the lives of two 
young boys in Ypsilanti Township. Sixteen year old Ernest Earl Lemons 
was shot in plain daylight, after a fight broke out between young 
people. Nine year old Cullen Ethington, who was a half a block away, 
was also killed by a stray bullet from that fight.
  Both young people are now being remembered by their classmates and 
teachers. The tree where Lemons fell, after he was shot, is now 
decorated

[[Page 24554]]

with teddy bears. Students at Erickson are planning to plant a tree or 
flowers in honor of the short life of fourth grader Cullen Ethington, 
who will be memorialized by his classmates as a peer mediator who 
helped students resolve their disputes without violence.
  School children are too often the victims of senseless gun violence. 
Gun violence results in injury and death, destroys families, and causes 
lasting psychological and emotional harm. In Michigan, each school is 
now forced to handle the trauma of children losing other children to 
gunfire. As many other school districts now know, violence and the fear 
of violence is not only tragic for individuals and families involved, 
it also interferes tremendously with the educational process. Students 
at Erickson, for example, are now spending time at school with trauma 
teams learning how to cope with death while their peers at other 
schools are learning about the pilgrims and practicing for the school 
play.
  Congress must act now to end the proliferation of gun violence. Like 
young Cullen, we must not only make a pledge to live our lives without 
violence, but must also send a message to others that violence is never 
the answer.
  My thoughts and prayers go out to the both the Ethington and the 
Lemons families.

                          ____________________