ROCKFORD, Ill. (WIFR) – Tamika Brown takes a breath before answering how her summer was.
On Sunday, a 27-year-old man was killed in a shooting on E. State Street, and the Sunday before that, another 27-year-old man was killed in a shooting in the 4500 block of Governors Drive.
Then, just days before the Governors Drive shooting, on Aug. 13, a homicide occurred near the 400 block of South Fifth Avenue.
“The way I describe it is like a Coke bottle with Mentos in it,” says Brown, a holistic trauma therapist at You Are Not Alone. “You just drop it in there, waiting for it to explode.”
Brown said what's “befalling” Rockford is unresolved trauma, a “mental health crisis” that's only now getting attention.
The most recent homicide, a shooting Sunday on E. State Street, occurred in the district of Rep. Tim Durkee (R). Durkee sees crime in Rockford on a downward trend but argues the recent incidents are just a part of city life.
“I think when you go into a metropolitan area you take on a certain amount of risk because the more people there are, the more bad guys there are,” Councilman Durkee said.
According to the City of Rockford, violent crime will decrease by 5% between July 2024 and July 2023. This trend continued from 2022, which saw a 22% decrease between July 2022 and July 2023.
Another statistic that's appealing to Councilman Durkee is that the city has an 85 percent murder solution rate, with 17 of the 20 murders last year resulting in an arrest.
Despite the positive trends, council members feel there are larger issues at the heart of violence in the city.
“We seem to be in a culture of violence, not just in Rockford, and I don't really understand why that is,” Councilman Durkee said.
Brown believes the answer lies in unresolved trauma: Therapists see violence as something that happens “when triggered,” and one way to stop it is to check yourself and others.
“What are you feeling? Then you can respond to what you're feeling,” Brown said. The mayor's office has been proactive in adopting trauma-informed response methods, including sending teams into communities after emergencies.
“All of our task forces are identifying these system-level issues,” said Brandon Tillman, community violence prevention manager for the city of Rockford, “and we're trying to address those issues by implementing strategies.”
As they wait for August's crime statistics to be released, those working to heal the area are proud of their work. Brown believes mental health has become more accepted in Rockford over the years, but the next step is to transfer trauma-informed knowledge to first responders and the next generation.
“Get him somewhere where he'll know how to process his trauma,” the therapist says. “So he doesn't end up in jail. So he doesn't die.”
The Rockford Police Department is searching for a suspect in connection to a recent homicide. Anyone with information can send an anonymous text message to 847411 with the message “RPDTIP.”
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