April 2026
This month’s edition came to me a little later than I expected, but strong, evermore.
When I was thinking about this month’s topic, a lot of ideas came into my head. I thought about writing about Donald Trump, and even the David and Celeste situation, because it’s something that stood out to me back in September.
September 2025 was a magical time for me. I went back to school for my bachelor’s degree in my third trimester of carrying life. I had a little bit more freedom, and I found out about this case on a drive home. I remember that drive being so magical a different scenic view , but in the background, I’m hearing the details of this case. TikTok detectives were connecting dots and sharing findings. The story was so tragic, I remember it sticking with me, especially because no immediate arrests were made. I wondered did he even do it? So many unanswered questions. A
I remember people coming forward and saying that Celeste was a runaway, and that they had tried to get her back in school multiple times. There were videos and rumors going around, even theories that there were two “Celestes,” with one being older to throw people off or confuse the timeline. Because again, Celeste was only about 14 or 15 years old when she died.
All that to say, when thinking about this month’s topic, I really wanted to connect the times we’re in now. What I’ve noticed in my search this month surge in violence, especially extreme amount of violence, pertaining to the community.
I’ve been noticing this through sources like Neighborhood Talk on Instagram and similar platforms that highlight these types of headlines. Headlines like “Donald Trump, President of the United States, evacuated from the White House Correspondents’ Dinner on April 25, 2026, due to a shooting incident.” What stands out to me is the tragic and chaotic incidents happening right now in our own communities. Very much on brand with the David and Celeste case.
This made me curious, why are so many cases involving violence in the headlines right now? Why is the War at home?
Last month we talked about heads rolling. We talked about Iran, about airstrikes, about a government too distracted by foreign conflict to tend to its own people. We asked: while leaders wage war abroad, who is protecting us at home?
April answered that question. And the answer is nobody.
Celeste Rivas & The Cost of Speaking Up
Her name was Celeste Rivas. She was fourteen years old. She loved to sing and dance. Every Friday night was movie night with her family. Her family says she always told them she loved them.
She is gone now, allegedly by the hands of singer D4vd, a man prosecutors say began a sexual relationship with her since she was thirteen. When Celeste threatened to expose him, prosecutors allege he used a sharp instrument to silence her permanently. He has since been charged with first-degree murder with along with other charges and now faces the death penalty.
This is not just a celebrity crime story. Allegedly, this is the story of a child who was groomed, exploited, and then killed for daring to speak her truth. What happens when grown men with power treat young girls as secrets to be kept. It is a story about what this culture protects and who it doesn’t.
Celeste deserved to grow up. She deserved a real chance at life, movie nights for decades to come. What she got instead was a predator with a platform and a system that didn’t stop him in time.
Her name is Celeste Rivas.
The Pattern: Children Are Not Safe
If Celeste’s story were an isolated incident, it would still be devastating. But April showed us it wasn’t isolated at all.
In Shreveport, Louisiana, a father of seven named Shamar Elkins posted a photo with his children on Easter Sunday then went on to allegedly kill eight children in a mass shooting. Eight children. On a holiday built around resurrection and new life.
In Atlanta, a seven-year-old boy was randomly attacked on a school bus by a thirteen-year-old while the driver ignored the incident entirely. His injuries were photographed. His mother is demanding answers. The system shrugged.
In Nebraska, a registered sex offender broke into a home, crept into a nine-year-old girl’s bedroom, pinned her to her bed, and was found at the foot of that bed with a bottle of lotion. He had done this before. He was registered. He still got in.
In Fresno, a woman attempted to kidnap an eight-year-old girl from her own home telling the child she was her real mother and had been stolen at birth.
We are not keeping our children safe. Not in schools. Not on buses. Not in their own homes Nor in their bedrooms. and the structures that are supposed to protect them are failing at every level.
The War Inside Our Homes
It Not only children.
Coral Springs Vice Mayor Nancy Metayer Bowen an elected official, a public servant, a Black woman who showed up to serve her community was shot three times by her own husband inside their home. He reportedly told a family member he did it because he couldn’t take it anymore. She survived. But the question of what it means to be a woman any woman, even one with a title inside four walls with a man who has decided he’s done: that question doesn’t go away with her survival.
A Houston woman who was pregnant was allegedly murdered by her boyfriend, who then dumped her body in a park. He is still being searched for.
A comedian ex-husband accused of twenty years of abuse responded to his ex-wife’s allegations by saying she simply wants the man he is today. Forty-seven thousand likes on that post. Fifteen thousand comments. People are watching and reacting but how many are believing her?
A mother in Texas was arrested after threatening to run over her infant because, in her words, the daddy didn’t want it. She recorded herself saying this to the child before placing him under a car.
A Long Island woman was convicted for throwing a lit stick of dynamite at her sleeping boyfriend after an argument. His hand was blown off.
These are not isolated incidents of individual cruelty. This is what happens when people are in profound pain with no real systems of support, no mental health infrastructure, no community accountability, no intervention before the explosion. We talked in January about what America neglects. This is what neglect looks like up close.
In The Streets
Offset rapper, public figure, father — was shot at the Seminole Hard Rock Casino in Florida. He is in stable condition. The details are still emerging.
Pooh Shiesty and his father Big30 were arrested by the FBI for allegedly robbing Gucci Mane at gunpoint at a music studio, reportedly forcing him to sign a release from his recording contract under duress. The Department of Justice confirmed it. The music industry, long glamorizing this kind of power and violence, now watches two of its own face federal charges for it.
An Arkansas teacher was charged after being caught on camera choking a student who called him “bruh.” His words: I’m not your bruh, I’m your sir. A teenager called him an informal greeting. He responded with his hands on that child’s throat.
In Nevada, a nineteen-year-old is facing open murder charges — he thought he was going to a friend’s house to play video games. His friends had a different plan.
What The Governor has to Say
After a seventeen-year-old was arrested for allegedly shooting and killing a teenage girl at the Mall of Louisiana, Governor Jeff Landry went off — blaming parents and lenient judges, declaring it’s not the government’s job to raise children.
He’s partly right. Parents matter. But Governor — where is the mental health funding? Where are the community programs? Where are the resources for families who are struggling? You cannot cut every social support structure down to nothing, watch communities collapse under the weight of poverty and trauma, and then stand at a podium and say the government’s hands are clean.
It is everyone’s job to raise children. That’s what community means.
Who’s Keeping Watch?
Celeste Rivas was fourteen. She tried to speak. She was silenced.
Shreveport’s eight children were gathered for Easter. They didn’t make it home.
A vice mayor was shot in her own house. A pregnant woman was dumped in a park. A nine-year-old was pinned in her bed. A seven-year-old was beaten on a school bus while a grown adult kept driving.
The war is not in the Middle East alone. The war is here. On our buses, in our bedrooms, in our neighborhoods, in our homes. And the people who are supposed to be keeping watch — the drivers, the governors, the systems, the industry, the men with power they are either looking away or are the ones pulling the trigger.
We cannot keep outsourcing our safety to institutions that have proven they will not protect us. We have to see each other. We have to say names. We have to demand better, not just from Washington, but from each other.
This is not about just violence, but a pattern of failure at every level measure to prevent it. From Celeste Rivas, a child who allegedly tried to speak and was silenced, to the children harmed in homes, schools, and neighborhoods, to women attacked by the very men closest to them, to public figures and everyday people caught in cycles of retaliation and survival mode.’ all the common thread is neglect that allows harm to escalate unchecked. These are not disconnected headlines; they are evidence of a system that reacts after devastation instead of intervening before it. When leadership deflects responsibility, when communities lack resources, and when warning signs are ignored, the result is exactly what we are witnessing now. The war at home is not a metaphor, it is the consequence of what happens when protection, accountability, and care are treated as optional. Until those become priorities in practice, not just in speech, these stories will continue to repeat, and the headlines will continue to write themselves. The war at home will not end until we decide, collectively, that everyone inside our borders deserves to live.
As always — stay informed, be grounded, and state your peace!
— Kyra Lashone
As She Wrote 
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