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Activity 3 Silent Reading
Read the following story silently.
The Program
By Cyndy Edwards Lively
with the Center for Community Safety, a
Emmitt Speaks stooped to duck under the group that had been organized to help
yellow and black plastic tape strung turn around repeat juvenile offenders.
between the oaks at the edge of the Most of the kids referred to the Center had
playground. Kneehigh grass made for slow spent time in Forsyth County Youth
progress. By the time he reached the steep Services, and some in state detention,
bank overlooking the creek, his shirt more than a few for violent offenses.
stuck to his back, and he felt like he was “How did he die?”
gargling rather than breathing the August “Gunshot to the back of the head. Still
air. Phoebe Sorenson shaded her eyes waiting on the M.E. I’m keeping the area
with a hand as she looked up from the clear for him and the crime scene guys.
creek bed. Tendrils of hair that escaped Tate and the principal already tracked up
from her ponytail curled around her the stream bed pretty good when they
sweat-soaked face. The homicide detective came down to check on him. I don’t want
greeted Emmitt with a sympathetic look anyone else down here.”
and a nod in the direction of the body “What’s taking so long? I thought you said
lying face-up in the shallow stream. he was found around eight.”
“Rierson said he was another one of “Big wreck on fifty-two, three or four cars
yours.” Emmitt had more than twenty-five and more than one casualty. M.E.’s got
years on the job, most of them in the his hands full this morning.”
Winston-Salem Police Department’s She shifted her gaze to body. “What can
Juvenile Section. He liked the young you tell me about the kid?”
homicide detective: she was sharp, “The last I heard,” Emmitt said, “Deshawn
meticulous, and a team player. He was accepted into a program run by a
couldn’t say the same for Rierson. The church out in the county and was doing
man was arrogant, abrasive, and in well: off drugs, attending school, and
Emmitt’s experience, generally staying out of trouble. Guess the report
uncooperative. It was a good thing Phoebe was overly optimistic.”
was primary on the case; Rierson wouldn’t “Any connection you know of to Juan
have bothered to notify him. “I appreciate Ramirez?”
the call,” Emmitt said. He stared down at Emmitt shook his head. “Other than both
the body of a young black male, barely having contact with CCS, I can’t think of
into his teens. any. I doubt they ran in the same circles.”
“Deshawn Reeves. What can you tell me, Juan had been two years older and barely
Phoebe?” spoke English when he entered the
“Not much, so far. A Reynolds High School system. The first time he was arrested for
student spotted the body about eight breaking and entering, he had only been
when he was cutting through the park on in the country a few weeks. His third
his way to school. Ran up to the school to arrest earned him six months in the
get help. The principal and the resource Stonewall Jackson Youth Development
officer,” she consulted her notebook, Center in Concord. Three months after his
“John Tate, came down to have a look, release, his body had been dumped in a
and Tate called it in.” shopping center parking lot on the east
“Who ID’d him?” side of town. Cause of death, a bullet to
“Tate did. Said the boy was a CCS kid: the back of the head. Rierson was the
trouble with a capital ‘T’.” Emmitt worked primary on Juan’s homicide investigation.
112 | Extensive Listening & Reading
