16-year-old killed in Des Moines police shooting was family's second recent loss
A 16-year-old boy shot and killed by Des Moines police Dec. 26 was the second son his family lost to gunfire in less than two months.
Monica Woods, the mother of the slain 16-year-old, also was the mother of Brandon Michael Tukes — a 23-year-old former Lincoln High School football star fatally shot Nov. 5 in the Phoenix suburb of Glendale, Arizona, according to police there.
Woods, speaking to the Arizona Republic, a sister Gannett publication of the Des Moines Register, declined to talk about the death of her younger son, who was listed as a sibling in Tukes' obituary.
But she confirmed she had lost him in the police shooting. Des Moines Police have not released his name.
Department officials said they fired at the boy when he began raising a gun toward them as they tried to de-escalate a domestic dispute at an apartment complex at 400 E. McKinley Ave.
More:Shots fired as Des Moines police killed armed 16-year-old audible on witness' video
The Iowa Department of Criminal Investigation is reviewing the shooting and will send its report to the Iowa Attorney General's Office to determine if it was justified. The three officers involved in the shooting have been placed on leave.
In her interview with the Republic, Woods recalled a phone call with Tukes a few hours before his death.
"He was doing very well. He told me he loved me and that he would call me later, and that later never came," Woods said.
A 16-year-old boy has been charged with first-degree murder in Tukes' death.
Mother: Son went to Arizona to 'make the world better'
In her conversation with The Republic, Woods, 41, said Tukes "was outgoing — very likable person." She said he had been pursuing a criminal justice education to be a police officer.
She said that one day in Iowa, Tukes brought home a map and told her that wherever his finger landed, "That's where he was going to go for a change and make the world better."
That place was 1,400 miles away in Phoenix. Tukes had been living there for about a year before his death, working at a warehouse and traveling between there and Iowa. He had a son, born in March.
Charging documents on Tukes' accused killer, who police have not named, show there was a fight between several people before Tukes was shot at an establishment serving as a tattoo parlor and barber shop. Tukes died at the scene. Two others who also suffered gunshot wounds survived.
Security footage captured Tukes in a conversation with someone "in a manner that would suggest the two were not amicable with one another," court documents state. This person said Tukes was trying to start a fight with him, according to charging documents.
The teen charged with murder eventually admitted during police interrogation to shooting Tukes, saying he was trying to defend the person in the argument with Tukes, charging documents stated. The person arguing with Tukes was wounded during the shooting.
Court documents say there was a second person who fired a gun, injuring an unidentified 14-year-old. This other shooter told police he fired at the first shooter after being shot at, according to court documents.
This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: Boy, 16, killed by Des Moines police was family's second recent loss
