People are woven into other people’s worlds, and when a life is STOLEN, the loss reaches far beyond the person whose life was taken. Lives connected by love, family, friendship, work and community are changed forever.
Some leave behind children and relatives who depended on them while others leave behind people who looked up to them, believed in them and thought the world of them. Their absence changes far more than one life.
They did not simply die. Their lives were STOLEN.
Remembrance is not simply looking backward. It is an act of dignity. It says that a person existed before their final moments and had stories, personalities, dreams, flaws, relationships and communities, just like you and me. Their entire humanity cannot be reduced to the moment their life was STOLEN.
For many people whose lives are taken and make the news, the public first meets them at the worst moment of existence. We learn what happened, what police or witnesses said, or what officials report from a jail, prison or detention center. What we often do not learn is who that person was before that moment. Families are left to remind us who their loved one really was.
Too often, before someone is humanized, we search their background and decide whether they were respectable enough, innocent enough or perfect enough to deserve sympathy. Yet most of us would probably be surprised by how many people we love, admire, look up to or would confidently vouch for have made choices we would never approve of, if we even knew their full story.
Some people we regard as nearly flawless may carry secrets, mistakes or parts of their history that would completely change how others judged them if everything were made public. The difference is that we have not been given access to their worst moments, so they continue receiving our love, grace and approval, while strangers whose lives become headlines are often denied the same humanity.
Dignity cannot belong only to people whose choices we approve of. Love does not erase accountability, and accountability does not erase humanity. We can condemn behavior, expect consequences and still recognize that a human being is larger than the worst thing they may have done.
If dignity disappears the moment we discover something objectionable about someone, then what we are extending is not dignity at all. It is approval, and those are not the same thing.
Dignity should not require a background check.
I believe there are at least four sides to stories like these. There is the story carried by the family, the story told through the police investigation or official record, the story of the person whose life was STOLEN and can no longer speak for themselves, and then there is the full truth that only God knows.
Body cameras, witnesses and official reports can show us pieces of what happened, but they cannot necessarily show us everything that led to that moment. One of the most important voices in the story is permanently absent.
A camera can capture a moment. It cannot capture an entire human life.
This fall, two annual days of remembrance give Milwaukee an opportunity to do something different. On Oct. 22, Milwaukee’s Stolen Lives Day of Remembrance, presented by ProsperME Inc. and the Milwaukee Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression, will honor all whose lives have been STOLEN in custody, at the hands of or under the watch of law enforcement, correctional and security systems. This includes cases where families continue to seek transparency, answers and accountability in the investigations of their loved ones’ deaths.
On Nov. 14, the Coalition for Safe Driving MKE will host Milwaukee’s World Day of Remembrance for Victims of Road Traffic Violence, honoring people whose lives were STOLEN on our roads. The circumstances surrounding these losses may differ, but both observances call us to look beyond headlines, investigations and statistics and remember the human beings at the center of them. The people behind these stories deserve the same fundamental thing: to be remembered as people.
That is why I want to remember
I remember my brother, Samuel Sharpe Jr., whose life was STOLEN by Columbus, Ohio, police officers who were in Milwaukee during the 2024 Republican National Convention. I remember D’Vontaye Mitchell, whose life was STOLEN by private security personnel, and Terrill Thomas, whose life was STOLEN while under the watch and care of the Milwaukee County Jail. I remember Donald Maier, whose life was STOLEN while under the watch and care of Wisconsin’s prison system, and those whose lives were STOLEN while under the watch of immigration enforcement and detention, like Alex Pretti.
I also remember those whose lives were STOLEN on our roads. I remember Jae Morgan and her unborn baby, Tyme. Morgan survived the crash, but Tyme’s life was STOLEN by reckless driving. I remember Pler Moo, Moo Nay Taw and Kar Lah Kri Moo, a mother and her two sons whose lives were STOLEN when a fleeing driver crashed into their vehicle. Tyme’s name stays with me because it reminds us of one of the most precious things taken when a life is STOLEN: time.
Statistics can tell us how many people lost their lives, but they cannot tell us who was supposed to be at Thanksgiving dinner or whose birthday still arrives without them. They cannot tell us who still reaches for a phone to call someone who will never answer again or who has to explain an absence to a child.
These people had favorite foods, favorite songs, inside jokes, plans for tomorrow and people who knew the sound of their laugh. Statistics can show us the size of a problem, but names remind us of the human beings behind the numbers.
That is why remembrance matters. It is not about living permanently in tragedy or allowing the circumstances surrounding a person’s death to become the only story we tell about their life. It is about giving families space to tell us the stories behind the headlines and who their loved one was before the rest of the world learned how their life was STOLEN.
Say their names
It is about saying their names long after the cameras leave and remembering that they lived full lives before tragedy introduced them to the rest of us.
As Milwaukee observes Stolen Lives Day and World Day of Remembrance, I hope we make room for the people at the center of these conversations and the families carrying love and grief after public attention moves elsewhere.
Their lives cannot and should not be reduced to the moment they were STOLEN. Remembrance requires us to see beyond the final moment and recognize the entire human being who existed before it. It asks us to remember not only how their lives were STOLEN, but how they lived.
We remember. Say their names. Their lives were STOLEN.
Angelique Sharpe, known in the community as “MsLadyInc,” works at the intersection of broken systems and resilient people. She lifts their voices and helps organize solutions. Sharpe recently completed her tenure as the Entrepreneur in Residence at Milwaukee Public Library. You can visit her website here.
Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under a Creative Commons license.
