Shooting victim saw music as key to better life

[penguinz0]

http://www.thestar.com/news/crime/article/...etter-life?bn=1

 

Before Andrew Stewart was shot dead, he had been trying to use his music as an escape from an often violent neighbourhood.

 

Stewart, a hip-hop artist who went by the stage name KD, had recorded an entire album’s worth of songs, and has a YouTube channel featuring his homemade videos, some of which have more than 1,000 views.

 

Friends say he focused intensely on music in the hopes of leaving a troubled lifestyle and making a better life for himself and his 5-year-old daughter.

 

“Jane and Finch is a bad area, we know this,” said Tenesha-Phoenix Lane, 24, a longtime friend of Stewart’s. They met when she lived in the Jane-Finch community and bonded over a love of hip-hop music.

 

“Everybody is just trying to find a way out. And his way out was through music. He was a father, a loving brother, son. He just took care of his daughter, went to the studio, chilled with his friends,” Lane said.

 

Stewart, 26, was killed Thursday around 10 p.m. outside a townhouse complex at 2901 Jane St. in North York. He had multiple gunshot wounds to the chest and abdomen, police said.

 

He died in hospital, making his death Toronto’s 24th homicide of the year. Police said a vehicle was seen fleeing the scene.

 

Mother Angela Wilson told reporters that her son had been in trouble with police in his youth but was trying to change by focusing on music.

 

And Lane said she didn’t believe he had any involvement with guns or gangs.

 

“In those areas, a lot of young guys get caught up in selling drugs … it’s not about the fact they want to be gangsters, it’s the fact that it’s fast money in a low-income area,” Lane said.

 

And like a lot of rap music, Stewart’s rhymes were full of hyperbole about hard living, guns under the mattress and selling drugs. But Lane insisted the real Stewart was different.

 

“Some rappers, not everything they rap about they do.”

 

“He just wanted to make it out. His mix tape was [posted] on an international site. He had shows to do. Last week he just finished recording another video … But every day he was with his daughter. He lived for his daughter,” she said.

 

His friend U.B., or Burnie, agreed. They also met in the Toronto rap scene and became “like brothers.”

 

“He was infatuated, in love with being a father to his daughter. She was his world,” Burnie said. “He worked whenever he [could], he had music projects, he made videos for people.”

 

Stewart worked odd jobs through temp agencies and tried to share what he had with friends and family, his friends said. Raised in Toronto, Stewart wore a Blue Jays baseball hat in many of his online videos.

 

“He loved Toronto. Toronto was his home,” Burnie said. He said Stewart was an inspiration to their group of friends.

 

“He always (had) a brighter light about him that said ‘cheer up,’ even if you’re in the darkest moments,” Burnie said.

 

Stewart was no stranger to tragedy himself. Friend and fellow rapper Eric Osawe was fatally shot by police in September 2010 after a raid on an Etobicoke home.

 

Two months ago, he posted a tribute video called “The Truth” to his YouTube channel. In it, he raps “Too many people have passed away/so I have to pray/and ask if I can last a day.”

 

 

Touching story, kids, teens and adults who find activities or clubs to participate, less/don't commit to crime.

[Mafia]

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[`Mo]

That's just sad

[Cressy]

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Im sure not the only one.