Shooting on West Marshall Street (UPDATED)
UPDATE 10/7/2012 6:50PM
The Richmond Police Department has identified the victim of the fatal shooting that occurred early this morning in the city. Shortly before 1:00 a.m., Nathan Ratigan, 24, 300 block of West Marshall Street, was shot outside his home. He was pronounced dead about an hour and a half later at VCU Medical Center.
UPDATE 10/7/2012 7:40AM
The police have identified this a homicide. This is the 2nd killing in the area this year (previously), and Richmond’s 36th homicide for 2012.
From the press release from the Richmond Police Department:
Shortly before 1:00 a.m., Richmond Police officers heard shots fired in the 300 block of West Marshall Street. They arrived within seconds and found a white male in his mid-20s who had been shot. The victim was pronounced dead about an hour and a half later at VCU Medical Center.
Major Crimes detectives are in the early stages of the investigation, but they believe the shooting occurred during a confrontation with four black males, all in their 20s. One male was wearing an orange polo shirt and gold necklace. Another male was wearing a blue polo shirt. The third male was wearing a plaid shirt. The fourth male was wearing a grey polo shirt. They were last seen running towards the intersection of Belvedere and West Broad Streets.
ORIGINAL POST 10/7/2012 1:14AM
The VCU text alert system is reporting a shooting in the 300 block of West Marshall Street.
No more information is available at this time, updates as they become available.
N Madison and w marshal. All roads blocked.
Homicide.
People need to stop killing people.
http://t.co/CHKzLhX1
Why do the news outlets constantly identify incidents in Jackson Ward as VCU incidents? The press release includes no indication that this was VCU related, and it occurred 1/2 mile from campus. This is tragic and scary for us residents, but the consistent identification of these incidents as campus crime tend to trivialize. This is a neighborhood issue, and we the residents need to be addressing the problem.
I’m guessing that VCU has a requirement or at least tendency to report serious incidents within a certain distance of campus directly to their students. I was first alerted to this by the VCU alert system.
I agree that this is confusing, but not surprising. The media get neighborhoods and parts of town wrong all the time.
Think of the coverage if this had happened on Friday . . .
Details on #RVA’s 36th homicide this year, which took place in Jackson Ward http://t.co/o1ilcVZa
Probably a good quarter of more of the residents in Jackson Ward are students. After VA Tech I think VCU is under a mandate to alert the VCU community, including nieghbors, to serious crime, especially shooting event. I, for one, am glad they do.
I’m simply disgusted by this incident. I’m so tired of reading about a group of 3-4 young African American males robbing, assaulting, or in this case killing, random defenseless citizens. It’s sickening.
Sure hope they catch these sub human scumbags. What a disgrace.
I think a quarter is a significant stretch. What I’m most concerned about is that the media looks at how the school is going to deal with the situation. As a resident, I would like to see the city handle it as a neighborhood situation, not a VCU problem. The student population certainly plays a role, and VCU needs to play a role from day one in teaching their student body that they are now part of an urban community, but addressing only the students leaves those who are actually invested out of the process.
It’s very clear that when students go through orientation, they aren’t educated on how to carry themselves in a city. This is evident from their inability to properly cross the street. Additionally, while you have their attention, they need to be informed of what their obligation to the community is when they move off campus. Lt. Hood was able to predict certain crime based on the school calendar. Once the students attract crime, it becomes our problem.
To complain about whether this murder is described as a neighborhood or VCU incident completely misses the point. 4 thugs entered someone’s private home and killed someone. Crazy. We are all invested in this as residents of JW. RPD sure better capture these hoodlums. These punks need to be put away for life or perhaps lose their’s.
This tragic incident is making me think twice about moving to the “up and coming” JW neighborhood. I walk out of my house now at any hour and I don’t give my safety a 2nd thought. I live in the country and it’s not truly comparable but I looked at houses in that block, it really made me think.
My heart goes out to his family and friends, senseless crime is very hard to understand and his families pain with dealing with his loss.
I moved out of that exact house just a few years ago. So i used to sit on that same porch all of the time. This is incredibly disturbing. I hated living in that area and I was always nervous when out at night. I am so much happier now where i live. Police need to monitor that area a lot closer. The neighborhood needs to be cleaned up. The apartment building next door is a source of a lot of the chaos and needs to be looked at. My heart goes out to Nathan and his family and friends.