Original Blog Entry: Woman shot at boyfriend's funeral

truesee — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 21:34:39 GMT

Woman, 34, fatally shot at boyfriend's funeral gathering

City detectives believe incident connected to earlier slaying, but motive unclear

A woman was fatally shot Thursday night outside this West Baltimore funeral home, where she was attending a private family gathering for her boyfriend, who was killed last week, police said. (Baltimore Sun photo by Justin Fenton / November 20, 2009)

Justin Fenton

Baltimore Sun

12:20 p.m. EST, November 20, 2009

Joseph H. Brown III's business is death.

A fourth-generation mortician, he directs the largest funeral facility in Baltimore and handles services for at least two or three city homicide victims per month.

Families of victims gunned down in the streets go to his West Baltimore business to find solace.

On Thursday night, the funeral home became a crime scene when a 34-year-old woman was shot and killed while stepping outside of a viewing for her boyfriend -- a 51-year-old man who had been shot and killed a week earlier.

Standing just beyond the crime scene tape in a light drizzle, an older man passing through the area watched as detectives gathered evidence.

"Some things supposed to be sacrosanct," he said.

But they aren't, Brown said as he sipped coffee outside of his business Friday morning, a bullet hole marring the glass vestibule. A few steps away, a man wearing gloves and plastic boots used bleach in an attempt to clean up blood from the sidewalk. It's not gone, but it's better, he told Brown.

"That's gone out the window," Brown said of respect for funerals. "This has become a fact of life as much here in Baltimore as it is in Afghanistan, Iraq and anywhere else. There's many wars going on in the world, and this just happens to be one of the wars in our community."

The irony, Brown said, is that Baltimore's high death toll helps fuel the funeral home industry here. He said members of his staff become "master embalmers," adept at taking victims who suffered gunshot wounds to the head and mak....

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