Kerrice Lewis was brutally murdered in Washington D.C. just days after Christmas.
Kerrice was a young Black lesbian woman, only 23 years-old, described by her grandfather William Sharp as a “free spirit” and that she would “light up a room, just talking and laughing.”
On December 28th, residents of Kerrice’s building called the Washington D.C. police to report hearing multiple gunshots. The officers arrived around 7:20pm to find a Lexus on fire with a woman’s body inside. It’s been reported that residents could hear the victim screaming from the trunk, where she had been stuffed before the car was set on fire. By the times the medics arrived, she was gone, suffering from multiple gunshot wounds and burns to her body. Her brutal murder is under investigation however no arrests have been made yet.
Sharp had taken care of Kerrice from the time that she was 11 years-old after her mother passed from a brain aneurysm. Just a year later, she lost her father who was tragically murder in Washington D.C. as well. Sharp said that Kerrice struggled in life because of these losses, but had been doing well lately with regular construction jobs and “was very excited because she had just finished taking some classes and was looking forward to taking some more.”
Kerrice’s murder follows a quadruple homicide of two Black lesbian women and their children in Upstate New York as well as a Black lesbian mom and her child in West Palm Beach, Florida. There has been a call on Twitter for mainstream media publications to cover these brutal crimes impacting Black queer women.
Black queer women get murdered and no one notices. This was brought to light because someone replyed to my tweet talking about the murder of other black lesbians. https://t.co/2IapdNqIWc
— Chokola 🇭🇹🌹 (@ShadleyLove) January 6, 2018
How is it possible that @nytimes has not yet covered the murder of Kerrice Lewis?
The @washingtonpost‘s 1st story of her murder was 129 words long. Their 2nd doesn’t mention Lewis’ name until the seventh graf–not to mention it leaves out that she was likely burned alive.
— Marsha McLeod (@marshamcleod_NY) January 7, 2018
It’s suspected that Kerrice’s murder is connected to Armani Nico Coles, her childhood best friend, who was found shot on the road about an hour before Kerrice was found just two miles away. He had an eight-year-old son.
Mercedes Rouhlac was Kerrice’s ex-girlfriend who said they were still close friends and kept in touch everyday. “No matter what she still loved me and my son,” Rouhlac told WJLA.
Say her name. Rest in peace, Kerrice Lewis.
