Justice for Charlene ‘Chay’ Holmes
Charlene ‘Chay’ Holmes
A shooting in Cambridge
It was a balmy late spring evening on Saturday, June 2, 2012, and the cheers of a softball game at Donnelly Field echoed through the streets of Cambridge, Massachusetts. Children played under the setting sun in the park, and the crack of baseball bats floated in the evening air. It was this evening that 16-year-old Charlene ‘Chay’ Holmes, and her older sister Shontae were just returning to their neighborhood. They were walking home from a McDonald’s about a mile from where they lived, in Central Square, where they had met up with a friend, Tracy. They parted ways with Tracy on the walk back, waving to her as they continued to their street—Willow St.
As they strolled together, a black four-door sedan rolled slowly down the street. Little did they know, the occupants of the vehicle were carefully scanning the neighborhood as they crept past, looking for their target. They slowed in front of a building up ahead, then drove off, rounding a corner and disappearing from sight. To anyone looking on, they could’ve just been lost, reading street signs or checking the houses for numbers. But their plans for the evening were far less innocuous.
By 8:00 PM, the two girls were passing by an apartment house at 34 Willow Street. It was here that Chay spotted her best friend, 17-year-old Thanialee Cotto-Felix on the steps of the front porch. Thanialee was braiding a man’s hair who lived in the building. Neither of the girls lived there, but Chay’s family lived a couple doors down on Willow.
None of them expected what happened next—the black four-door sedan had circled back and was coming down Willow Street towards them. It slowed as the tinted windows of the passenger’s side window rolled down. From within, an outstretched arm appeared holding a handgun. A quick spray of bullets was fired towards the porch—five shots rang out.
The shooter fired aimlessly towards where the girls stood, and they tried to duck at the sudden sound. Chay’s sister, Shontae, managed to run away unharmed. She went to their nearby home for help. A silence came after the burst of gunfire and then the car sped away. Behind it, a bloody scene: Thanialee and Chay had both been struck in the drive-by shooting. Chay’s was lying on the sidewalk, while Thanialee had crumpled onto the porch, bleeding from her abdomen.
People began flooding to the scene. An anonymous witness later told Wicked Local Cambridge that he had just finished a softball game at the park when he’d heard the shots, and saw the black sedan speed off. Among those responding to the scene was Cheryl Hall, a family friend who had just spoken with Chay earlier that day. She later said in an interview with the Boston Globe, “She was lying there and I picked her hand up and was trying to talk to her.” Cheryl wanted to tell Chay that her grandson had, in fact, hit the home run she’d wished for him; he’d played that very afternoon across the street at Donnelly Field. Chay’s father Roland arrived as well, dropping to his knees as he gathered his daughter in his arms. Blood darkened the front of Chay’s shirt as Roland held his daughter one last time. Her aunt would later say that she believed Chay had been shot through the heart.
Chay and Thanialee were very close—best friends—despite their one-and-a-half-year age gap (Thanialee was a senior, and Chay just a sophomore). I imagine the nervous excitement of planning the next chapter of their lives: Thanialee college-bound, Chay inheriting the coveted title of upperclassman at Cambridge Rindge and Latin High School.
Though Thanialee had survived the shooting, Chay had died of her wounds.
Charlene ‘Chay’ Holmes
Charlene Diverra Holmes, who went by “Chay,” was born to parents Charlene and Roland Holmes on December 21, 1995. She was one of seven children, raised in Cambridge, Massachusetts. She loved to play dress-up as a little girl, and never outgrew the joy of expressing herself with vibrant colors and outfits. Red lipstick became her signature as she grew up, and depending on who you asked, she may have even wanted to be a fashion designer, though others would argue a nurse, or even a lawyer. Chay was a straight-A student and a role model to her peers, participating in anti-bullying events. Though quiet, she was a friendly and funny girl, who seemingly got along with everyone. During the summers, she loved to visit the local pool. She kept a full schedule: volunteering with the Salvation Army, attending church with family, spending time with friends, and staying active with track and softball meets.
The target
Three days after the shooting, Tuesday brought with it few advancements in the case. Thanialee remained in critical condition, and a spokesperson from the DA’s office said they were hopeful about leads. A 24-hour anonymous hotline had been established. They were trying to determine whether the girls were the intended targets of the shooting, echoing the sentiments of the community that it seemed to be a wrong-place, wrong-time situation. Chay’s mother had called her daughter an “innocent bystander,” adding that she had told her not to hang out at the porch of 34 Willow. Chay’s brother, Kenyatta, said, “all of us are having trouble realizing ... that she’s actually gone. She had a future, and she never caused trouble.” One neighbor perhaps said it best: “She wasn’t in the wrong place; she was on her way home.”
The same could not be said for the man whose hair was being braided by Thanialee that evening. Some witnesses claimed that the shooting was a calculated retaliation, and that the resident of 34 Willow was the intended victim. I am inclined to assume that the search conducted at that location following the shooting was of his apartment unit. Cambridge PD Superintendent Paul Ames would later say of the shooting that, “whoever was in that car was looking for their target. [They] went by that house once, identified who they were looking for, and came back around.”
Kensley “Kenz” David
July 3, 2014 was a Thursday, and Kensley David, who went by “Kenz,” who was 22 years old at the time, was hanging out in front of his Windsor Street home, where he lived with his mother and sister. Windsor Street is also in Cambridge, just one block over from Willow, where Chay had died two years prior. That evening, a black sedan rolled past Kenz and a shooter opened fire from the vehicle, hitting him in the head. He was transported to Mass General, and succumbed to his injuries there the next day—Friday, July 4. The similarities were striking—another drive-by shooting, perpetrated by a black sedan, within two blocks of one another—could the black sedans in these shootings be the same vehicle? The main difference—Cambridge PD said that the shooting was no accident—Kenz had been targeted.
The black Sedan
The police have never said that the two murders were connected, but perhaps because of the renewed public attention on the investigation, they chose this moment to release some critical information in Chay’s case—information that they had had from the beginning, and kept hidden from the community for two years.
On Monday, July 14, a week and a half after Kenz was killed, Cambridge PD released surveillance photos of the car used in Chay’s killing on Willow Street. They had never spoken to the press officially about the type of vehicle—it was only through the sleuthing of reporters that the description—a black sedan—had emerged.
Now, still frames from security footage were exclusively released to Boston 25 and shared publicly.
The footage captures the rear of the vehicle and shows the license plate, but sadly, the resolution of the grainy footage is inadequate to resolve the numbers and letters. It looks like the type of footage you might get from something like a Ring camera mounted near your front door.
The video confirmed what police had already said—the car in question circled the block once before unleashing the bullets upon 34 Willow.
The police have not confirmed the make or model of the vehicle—some reports suggest that it is a Nissan. The photos have a lot of noise, chromatic aberration, and pixelation, but I believe that there is enough detail to confirm the exact make and model (or at least a narrow the search to a short list of options). Overall, the vehicle doesn’t attract much attention—there are no obvious modifications, the rims look stock, black is a common color, and the body style is pretty unremarkable. Perhaps the killers chose this vehicle for that reason—it was just another black 4-door sedan. The interior of the vehicle is obscured by the windows, which are rolled up, but you can make out what looks like the outline of a person in the back seat on the right, which suggests that there were at least two, but perhaps 3 or 4 people involved. The public began to scrutinize the long-awaited images, but they faced an impossible question from police—do you recognize this ordinary-looking vehicle driving around your neighborhood from a Saturday evening two years ago?
Police have disclosed nothing further about the car, and it’s unknown if any meaningful leads came from the photos. Chay’s case continued to grow colder. Detectives kept a picture of Chay sitting on their desks as a reminder that it remained unsolved, and it ate away at them as the years slipped by.
Justice for Chay
Today, Chay would be 29, long-since done with her high school days and onto new seasons of her life. Perhaps she would’ve settled into a career, found love, and begun a family of her own. It’s impossible to know.
A local poet wrote an elegy in her honor in the weeks following the shooting. Jonathan King dedicated “Willow Street Elegy” to Chay and Thanialee:
Cambridge awakens to find that this is no figment, no nightmare. Yes, one of the girls has died.
Our city is shaken.
Despite the pain, life will go on, but not as it was before.
The pallor of the rose is their despair.
This should not happen in Cambridge. Not here—nor anywhere—that two young girls sit out and talk of whatever girls talk about, should one awake to find her friend is dead.
The pallor of the rose is their despair.
If you have any information on the murder of Charlene Holmes, please contact the Massachusetts State Police at (781) 897-6600, or Cambridge Police Investigations Section at (617) 349-3370. Tips can also be submitted anonymously by calling (617) 349-3359 or online at cambridgepolice.org/tips
Continue Chay’s story: Listen to the podcast episode. This text has been adapted from the Murder, She Told podcast episode, Justice for Charlene 'Chay' Holmes. To hear Chay’s full story, find Murder, She Told on your favorite podcast platform or listen on the player at the top of the page.
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Vehicle used in Charlene Holmes’ murder
Vehicle used in Charlene Holmes’ murder
Vehicle used in Charlene Holmes’ murder
Sources For This Episode
Newspaper articles
Various articles from Abington Mariner, Boston Examiner, Boston Globe, Boston Herald, Braintree Forum, Cambridge Chronicle, Metro-Boston, Pittsfield Berkshire Eagle, The Daily Item, The Enterprise, and Wicked Local, here.
Written by various authors including Acacia Nunes, Amanda Cedrone, Amy Saltzman, Ashley Studley, Barbara Foster, Brian Ballou, Brock Parker, Erin Baldassari, Evan Allen, Flint McColgan, Jessica Heslam, Jonathan King, Matt Stout, Monika Wahi, Paul Angiolillo, Sara Feijo, Sara Salinas, Travis Anderson, and William Dowd.
Online written sources
(to follow)
Online video sources
(to follow)
Photos
As credited above
Credits
Research, vocal performance, and audio editing by Kristen Seavey
Writing by Kimberly Thompson
Research, photo editing, and additional writing by Byron Willis
Additional research by Amanda Connelly
Murder, She Told is created by Kristen Seavey.