The murder of a child

UPDATE: A Facebook page has been set up in Justin's memory. If you would like to offer your condolences, you may do it there. So far almost 2000 people signed on.

How do you wrap your mind around the murder of a 12 year old boy?
Justin Bloxom was described by a teacher as a bright, attentive, well-behaved student. This week is spring break at his school, and he was spending the night with friends. The boys stayed up half the night, probably watching movies and just being young teenagers. There is nothing wrong with that, everyone who has raised kids has been through it.
In this case, something went terribly wrong. When the other boys woke up, Justin was gone and no one knew where.
The police were called and an amber alert was issued. Yesterday afternoon Justin’s body was found beside Hwy. 171. A suspect, Brian Horn, was soon identified, questioned and charged.
I have heard from one source that there was possibly a Facebook connection between Justin and the suspect. If that is true, it will come out. Police are doing forensics on computers from both Justin and the suspect.
Justin’s phone was missing. A broken cell phone was found in Horn’s taxicab, and Bossier City police are determining if it is Justin’s phone and if it can be restored. In any event, the service provider will be able to furnish every call made in and out of Justin’s phone.
An autopsy should be completed today and the exact cause of death will be known.
The entire area is under a pall, trying to understand what happened and why.
We can only imagine the trauma that Justin’s family is going through. This is a hard case for police to deal with too, but I have no doubt that they will come through in their best professional manner.
Justin’s friends and schoolmates are likewise in shock and disbelief. How do you discuss something like this with young people when you can’t even begin to understand it yourself? The answer is that kids have to learn, as we do, that sometimes horrible things happen despite all of our best efforts.
I don’t know what I am trying to accomplish with this blog post, other than to verbalize what I and so many others are feeling today.
Our prayers and thoughts are with Justin’s heartbroken family. Nothing anyone can say can make this better for them, but they need to know that the entire community is at their side.