Rev. Leon Kelly pointed to the immigration of Latinos into the mostly black Cole, Park Hill and Five Points neighborhoods as one of the causes of the friction. He said the city’s Park Hill Bloods and East Side Crips — which have been locked in years of bloody battle — each feel like its territory is being invaded.
Near the corner of Bruce Randolph Avenue and Gilpin Street, bouquets and a teddy bear wearing sunglasses are tethered to a handicapped parking sign for a man killed April 11. Two blocks away, an array of candles and fresh flowers hug the sidewalk in a patch of tall grass across the street from a church where a man was slain last weekend. A mile to the east, empty bottles of vodka with “Miss you always” scribbled on them lean against a tree where bullets fired from a passing car ended the life of a 22-year-old in January.
Makeshift memorials to men gunned down are constant reminders of the gang war enveloping northeast Denver. Gunfire echoing in the night has become just another one of the neighborhood’s expected sounds, like barking dogs and wailing sirens.
One man who lives in the Cole area says when he hears shots, he goes inside and ducks. A woman in northeast Park Hill said she has thrown herself to the floor.
“You can’t go anywhere without someone mentioning something about somebody getting killed,” Steven Walker, a 30-year resident of the Cole area, said last week outside his home. “It’s got elderly people scared to even go out to their porches to get their mail.”
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