'Community needs to come together more': Ten Point Coalition member after Far Eastside homicide

INDIANAPOLIS — Leroy Smith's time in the Indianapolis Ten Point Coalition can be documented in photographs.

“Every chance we get to talk to people, we help them we mediate, we give referrals, so we are doing a lot of work on the Far Eastside,” Smith said.

Smith said he has been with the Ten Point Coalition for four years. His goal is to help mitigate crime by patrolling the areas of 42nd and Mitthoefer through 38th and Mitthoeffer three days per week.

“It’s a low poverty area, so things like that begin to happen more and more, we are seeing it frequently now than we were seeing it,” Smith added.

The area Smith patrols is across the street from Thursday night's homicide. IMPD said they found a man shot and killed outside the Marathon gas station on East 38th Street.

“We are here to help – we are here to make sure that justice is served,“ IMPD officer Samone Burris said.

Court documents show that a fight over a car crash led up to the shooting.

The suspect, who WRTV is not naming until he has been formally charged, returned to the scene more than an hour after shooting the victim, yelling, "I shot him."

“We cannot stress enough that to resolve conflict, to resolve issues, picking up a weapon is essentially an end-all for someone in that situation,” Burris said.

Smith said during his time walking the streets with the Ten Point Coalition, he noticed more and more people having guns on them.

“I think the community needs to come together more," Smith said. "If you see something, say something. It could save lives."

Ten Point Coalition recently added a weekend crew that patrols the area of 38th Street and Post Road, but Smith said it’s going to take a community effort to clean up the violence on the Far Eastside.

“It takes more than just us," Smith said. "It takes a lot of these organizations to come alongside of us and say what is that we can do, let’s do this together."