Julian Calderon was nine years old when police found him dead from a gunshot wound inside a northwest Indianapolis condo. His mother, 33-year-old Shatayvia Alisha Calderon, lay nearby with her own gunshot wound. Both were pronounced dead at the scene Monday afternoon.
Officers from the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department got the call around 1:05 p.m. on October 19. Someone reported a person shot at the Village at Eagle Creek Condominiums in the 4400 block of Village Lane. When they walked in, they saw the mother and boy. A firearm sat in the apartment.
The Marion County Coroner’s Office later named them. Detectives say Shatayvia shot her son and then turned the gun on herself. The coroner ruled Julian’s death a homicide and hers a suicide. This marked the second murder-suicide in Indianapolis in one week.
Julian should have been at school or playing outside that Monday. Instead his life ended in the place he lived. Police have not said what happened in the hours before the shots. They are talking to one cooperative witness who lives nearby.
Investigators are checking if officers had been called to that condo before. They also want to know if the family ever dealt with the Indiana Department of Child Services. No one has filled in those blanks yet.
Neighbors watched officers work the scene through the afternoon. Officer Drew Brown called it unthinkable. He said the department would keep looking for answers and offer help to anyone who needed it in the days that followed.
The gun is in evidence. The questions remain open. A nine-year-old boy is gone, and the woman who raised him is gone with him.
Leave a Reply