Tulsa, Oklahoma | July 10, 2011
Kanisha Sanae Jackson was a 27-year-old teaching assistant.
She had no known ties to gangs.
She wasn’t accused of any crime.
She wasn’t the intended target.
Yet she lost her life in a cycle of violence that had begun years earlier.
A Double Homicide in North Tulsa
On July 10, 2011, Tulsa Police officers responded to a shooting at a residence in the 648 block of East 53rd Street North.
Inside the home, officers found Kanisha Jackson and her boyfriend, 28-year-old Bryan Eugene Mitchell (also known as Brian), suffering from fatal gunshot wounds.
Both died at the scene.
According to Tulsa Police, the murders were part of a violent chain of gang retaliation that stretched across four years.
The Violence That Came Before
The violence began on July 9, 2008, when 18-year-olds Teontae Ray and Tajuan Davis were found shot to death inside a tan Chevrolet Caprice near East 41st Street North and North Columbia Avenue.
Both teenagers had been shot in the head.
Detectives identified Bryan Mitchell and Scott Norman as the primary suspects.
However, investigators said witnesses refused to cooperate or testify because they feared gang retaliation.
Without witness cooperation, the case went cold.
Three years later, Bryan Mitchell was murdered.
Kanisha Jackson—an innocent bystander with no known involvement in the conflict—was killed alongside him.
Another Killing, One Conviction
The violence did not end there.
On July 14, 2012, Scott Norman was located in a Best Buy parking lot on Skelly Drive near Yale Avenue.
A gunman opened fire, killing Norman.
During that targeted attack, another innocent life was taken.
Graydon Wesley Brown, 58, was shopping for a birthday gift for his wife while accompanied by his 10-year-old daughter when a stray bullet pierced the store’s glass entrance and struck him.
He later died from his injuries.
Unlike the earlier killings, investigators solved that case.
Authorities identified Willie Wise as the gunman.
Prosecutors said Wise stalked Scott Norman from a nearby mall before carrying out the shooting while wearing a sports jersey bearing the words “Let’s Eat.”
Wise was convicted of two counts of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Justice Still Denied
Despite that conviction, the murders of Kanisha Jackson and Bryan Eugene Mitchell remain unsolved.
Investigators continue to say that a wall of silence has prevented accountability.
Kanisha’s family has waited more than a decade for justice.
She was never part of the violence.
She should never have become one of its victims.
Anyone with information regarding the murders of Kanisha Sanae Jackson and Bryan Eugene Mitchell is urged to contact the Tulsa Police Homicide Unit at 918-596-9222 or submit an anonymous tip to Tulsa Crime Stoppers at 918-596-COPS (2677).
© The Vivid Faces of the Vanished
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