A few days before her brother’s funeral service Sherketa Fance posted on her Facebook page a haunting question that may never be answered: “Albert why.”
The name Albert is an apparent reference to Albert Antown Sistrunk, 38, who is now jailed and charged with second-degree murder in the death of Christopher Jones. A lifelong resident of Coconut Grove, Jones was shot and killed in the early hours of June 19 at the corner of Douglas Road and Oak Avenue. He was 57.
Jones and Sistrunk knew each other, and most everybody in the West Grove knew them. Jones’ friends called him Rolex, and he was a familiar figure as he roamed the neighborhood on his red bicycle. “I’ve known him since his birth,” said Thaddeus Scott, 68, who noted that Jones was killed just two blocks from his home. “Always been a respectful young man.”
The shooting has rattled the tight-knit community of the West Grove, where family histories are long and intertwined. “We are all connected to each other,” said Scott. “As a community, we all felt like we were related, where your fate means as much to me as it does to you. If there was a problem, as Grovites, you would have thought [someone] would have brought that issue up.”
Among those who cannot understand what happened is Jones’ son, Chris Gordon, 34. “I’m devastated,” said Gordon, who grew up in the Grove and is now a Fulton County (GA) Sheriff’s deputy. He said he also knows Sistrunk. “I would see him around the neighborhood,” Gordon said. “I have no idea why he would do that. You can’t let things turn to gun violence.”
If there was a problem between Jones and Sistrunk, it exploded on a Wednesday at 1:15 a.m. Jones had just stepped off his bicycle on Douglas Road, a few blocks south of US 1, when a 2009 white Nissan Murano pulled up and the driver hopped out with a gun, according to a surveillance video obtained by Miami police. The driver, later identified as Sistrunk, approached Jones and pistol-whipped him, police said.
“While the victim was struck by the firearm, the firearm was then discharged, striking the victim in the left shoulder in a downward trajectory,” according to the arrest affidavit. The shooter fled the scene and Jones was taken to Jackson Memorial Hospital, where he later died.
With the help of license plate readers and the surveillance video, police located the white Nissan parked in front of a house in Goulds, in Southwest Miami-Dade. Undercover officers were dispatched, and later watched a man who matched the shooter’s description leave the house in a blue Honda Accord driven by a woman.
The Honda pulled into a convenience store on Southwest 152 Avenue, where officers conducted a traffic stop.
After Sistrunk got out of the car, officers saw a baggie of suspected marijuana fall to the ground. A search revealed that Sistrunk also was in possession of suspected cocaine along with $899 in cash.
Stains on Sistrunk’s shirt and shorts tested positive for blood, police said.
Jones’ death was the second through gun violence in the West Grove since the February murder of 24-year-old Demonte Poitier. Police say the killings are unrelated.
“I’m hurting,” Fance, Jones’ sister, told NBC-6 hours after her brother’s killing. “He was always cracking up. He was funny. He was a sweetheart, you know. He aggravates me a lot, but I wish I could have that right now.”
Gordon said he will remember his father “as joyful, always happy. I have never seen him angry or upset at anyone. He was an overall good person.”
In addition to Gordon and Fance, Jones leaves another sister, a brother and a grandson.
Funeral services for Jones were scheduled to be held last Saturday, June 29, at Macedonia Missionary Baptist Church.
Editor’s note: This story has been updated to include a Spotlight interview with Jones’ son, Chris Gordon.
