Fatal Shooting on Christmas, 85th West and Western

South L.A. woman gunned down on Christmas in front of 3-year-old daughter
Daily News Wire Services
Posted: 12/27/2010 08:31:07 AM PST
Updated: 12/27/2010 08:38:27 AM PST


SOUTH LOS ANGELES -- Police today said a woman shot to death on Christmas night was leaving the home of an acquaintance when she was gunned down, according to a sergeant releasing new information.

Kashmier Shari James, 25, had been visiting a male acquaintance at a home on the 1700 block of 85th Street, Sgt. Jim Lewis said. She was getting into her car at about 10:20 p.m. Christmas night when two men in a dark blue vehicle drove up and fired nine shots, striking her once in the head, before fleeing south on Western, Lewis said.

It has not been determined whether the male acquaintance was the intended target of the suspects, he said. There is nothing to indicate that the suspects were involved with a criminal street gang, he added.

Lewis said James had no criminal record.

Friends and family today mourned the death of the woman who was gunned down in front of her 3-year-old daughter in South Los Angeles.

Paramedics pronounced her dead at the scene at 10:41 p.m. Lewis said.

Her daughter, who was in a carseat in the back seat of the vehicle, was unharmed. She was turned over to her father at the 77th Street station.

A candlelight vigil was held at the crime scene today, according to broadcast reports.

"This 3-year-old will never grow up to see her mama," James' boyfriend, Chris Jackson, said in broadcast reports. "I don't know how to explain it to her, to tell her, she's not here, she's not here."

Cousin Sharonda Conley was distraught. "I don't understand why they would take somebody's life in front of their kid on Christmas," she said.

Anyone with information on the shooting was asked to call LAPD detectives at (213) 485-4175.