In one of the worst mass killings in Chicago in years, Lakesha Doss (left), Whitney Flowers (right) and three men were found shot to death Wednesday in a ransacked South Side home.
For seven months, Lakesha Doss’ family didn’t know where she was, who she was with, what she was doing.
Their worst fears were confirmed when they learned the 17-year-old was one of five people fatally shot in a home in the 7600 block of South Rhodes Avenue. The bodies were found Wednesday.
Calling Lakesha “the angel the world needs to know,” her aunts Barbara Thompson and Cinnamon Thomas tried to explain how their niece, a “joyous spirit” who loved playing with her four younger sisters, ended up murdered in a house that a source said may have been used as a place of prostitution.
“She tried to let go of the lifestyle, but the lifestyle would not let go of her,” Thompson said. “There were struggles from influences we knew nothing about.”
Lakesha worked as a stripper at Arnie’s Idle Hour in Harvey with Whitney Flowers, another of the victims, Flowers’ family said.
Lakesha’s aunts said she told them in December 2006 she “did it [stripping] for a week or two” after she ran away from home in October 2006, when she was 15.
Lakesha returned home, and family members said she repeatedly received threatening phone calls. They did not elaborate, though Thompson said “outside influences trickled into the house.”
Thomas and Thompson said they think their niece was concerned about the safety of her younger sisters when she left again in October 2007, a month before she turned 17.
Thompson said Lakesha would occasionally call home but didn’t discuss her lifestyle.
“There were a lot of rumors and talk about that,” Thompson said of Lakesha working as a stripper.
In Illinois, exotic dancers must be 18 or older, said Susan Hofer, spokeswoman for the state Financial and Professional Regulation Department. If the dancer is under 18, it’s child pornography.
Three bouncers at Arnie’s refused to comment on Lakesha’s employment at the club. Arnie’s attorney could not be reached for comment. Calls to Arnie’s were not returned or were hung up on.
Sandra Alvarado, the City of Harvey’s public relations manager, said Arnie’s is “quiet” and that she wasn’t aware of any illegal behavior there.
Before running away from home, Thompson said Lakesha was a hard worker who picked up odd jobs, such as baby-sitting for neighbors, to help support the family.
“This whole incident is basically another child being killed,” Thompson said. “Now you have five families grieving.”
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Whitney Flowers was born with a drug addiction and abandoned as a newborn at a local train station.
But a single mother adopted her and raised her to become a young woman with a megawatt smile and dreams of owning a beauty salon.
When Flowers was slain with her boyfriend and three others this week in a South Side home, she was still working on that dream. In the meantime, she was raking in cash — up to $2,000 on some nights — as a stripper at a Harvey club.
She had a 2-year-old son, Khari, with her boyfriend, as well as a taste for expensive clothes, a generous streak and a Mercedes-Benz that was an April 10 birthday gift from the boyfriend, a party promoter dripping in diamonds.
“I just feel bad,” her mother, Cheryl Flowers, said Thursday as young Khari played nearby. “A child doesn’t have a mother or a father.”
Chicago Police said the mass killing “was definitely planned” and apparently carried out by at least two people. But they acknowledged they don’t have any suspects.
“The bottom line is, we need the community’s help,” Deputy Supt. Steve Peterson said.
Friends founds Flowers, 22, of Markham, her boyfriend, Donovan “Don P” Richardson, and the three others — Anthony Scales Jr., Reginald Walker and Lakesha Doss — shot to death in a two-story house in the 7600 block of South Rhodes on Wednesday afternoon.
Walker lived with his cousin, Richardson, in the home. Scales Jr. was a bank computer analyst. Whitney Flowers and Doss, 17, worked together at Arnie’s Idle Hour Cocktail Lounge in Harvey, the Flowers family said.
Relatives think the home was targeted by robbers, but police said they don’t yet have a motive.
“It wasn’t something that was random — no killer running in the neighborhood,” Area 2 Cmdr. Eddie Welch said. “They were targeted.”
A source said the home, which was being rented by Richardson, may have been used for prostitution. Richardson’s brother Jason Alfred said he knew nothing about such allegations.
On the reports of possible prostitution at the home, Welch said police will “follow every angle to determine the relevance of that information. … We’ve had our prostitution — our vice unit — gang intelligence unit as well as our narcotics unit assist us.”
Terry Arrington, Scales’ cousin, said he helped find the bodies.
“The boys were good, good guys,” said Arrington, who said he passed a police lie detector test after the slayings.
“I need some answers,” he said. “I need some answers, man.”
5 killed in S. Side home
Friends had gathered for barbecue before shooting
