Police unsure if murdered man, pregnant woman were intended targets

DETROIT (WJBK) - A pregnant mother was one of two people fatally shot on Detroit's southwest side Wednesday. Sophia Wilson was senselessly killed in the attack, along with an unidentified white male who was with her.

The 29-year-old was four months pregnant and a mother of two, and neighbors say they watched her take her young children to school earlier on Tuesday.

The white male killed was in his late 20s to early 30s. They were killed just after 6 p.m. Tuesday when multiple shots were fired into a house on Deacon Street near Visger, striking each of them in the head.

"They were seated inside the house together on separate couches when an unknown shooter approached the residence with a long gun and fired from outside into the house," Capt. Darin Szilagy said. Police are unsure if they were the intended targets.

The gruesome scene drew a crowd, and two men became hostile with police and were arrested.

"One person at the scene had a couple guns on him and another person, some witnesses pointed him out as possibly having some information," Szilagy said. "During our interview, things turned a little hostile."

They were handcuffed four houses down from the crime scene, on the very same property where Rosa Parks used to live when she moved to Detroit to escape persecution in the south.

"What a waste of human life. She would be very disappointed," said Rhea McCauley, the niece of Rosa Parks.

Her niece, who is trying to turn the property into an urban garden to educate children and feed the homeless, watched the drama unfold.

"To know that we had two people that were murdered right in front of the Rosa Parks' property, where we're trying to build an organic garden, is too much," McCauley said. "Too much."

McCauley said her aunt would have been disappointed.

"It's easier to be cruel," she said. "It's easier to be unkind. It's easier to take your fellow humans for granted like their lives don't matter."

Police still do not have a description of the shooter or a vehicle they're looking for, but they say they are reviewing some surveillance video that might give them a better idea.

"In all of my years out here, I have not seen anyone die over anything that I thought was worthy," said Szilagy. "It's all a bunch of crap - and people have got to think better and do better."

If you'd like to make a donation to Wilson's family to help with her burial, you can do so via their GoFundMe account here.