Mom of 4-year-old: ‘I watched my baby get shot’

She saw the unthinkable and was powerless to stop it.

Stephanie Thompson, 21, said she was running to scoop up her four-year-old son when a man with a machine gun aimed at the boy and pulled the trigger.

Brandon Thompson collapsed on the sidewalk in a pool of blood. He had been shot in the head.

"I watched my baby get shot," said Stephanie Thompson through her tears. "I couldn't get to him fast enough."

Neither could law enforcement.

Thompson said she had called Camden police the day before her son was killed to report that a man was in the neighborhood with a machine gun.

"I called 911 and told them," Thompson said. "He was just riding around. It wasn't like he was hidin' it.

"This could have been avoided if they had done their job," she said.

Police confirmed late this morning that Stephanie Thompson called police Sunday to report a man on a bicycle with a gun. Authorities are reviewing police logs now to determine what was said and the police response.

There were conflicting accounts today between law enforcement and eye witnesses to the murder as to whether a machine gun was used yesterday. Police also questioned Thompson's account of the murder, saying the child ran into the crossfire and was killed.

Brandon was playing on Norris Street late yesterday afternoon shortly before 5:30 when the man, identified as Donald Lindsey, returned, riding a bicycle, and wielding the gun.

Stephanie Thompson was around the corner when she heard a series of blasts. She ran to find her son.

She rounded the corner of Norris and Sheridan. She saw Brandon running towards her on the sidewalk. Children were scattering everywhere.

The man on the bike was in the middle of the street. He saw Brandon, took aim, and fired, she said.

The young mother ran to her son and lifted his head in her arms. There was blood everywhere.

"I went to go pick him up and he had blood coming from everywhere. I just held him and told him to get up," she said. "But he wouldn't get up. He was only 4. And he was trying to run to his mommy. I couldn't get there in time."

Camden police arrived minutes later.

"The cops came and took my baby to the hospital and we wasn't even there 5 minutes and he died," Thompson said.

Thompson, who also has a two-year-old son, Marquis, said she knew her son's killer. Neighbors said Lindsey had a child with a woman who lived on Norris Street.

"He (Lindsey) looked me dead in my face when my son got shot. He knew he shot my son and he looked at me," she said.