3 days ago
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DINUBA, Calif. (KSEE/KGPE) - For months, a question of moms has been sweeping done the Central Valley, turning their grief into a campaign arsenic they telephone for betterment to Prop 57.
Dinuba mom, Susan Grote, knows grief each excessively well. Her son, Matthew Bonds, was 1 of 4 of her household members killed successful his location connected January 6, 2024, in Reedley.
"Never successful a cardinal years thought this would hap to us," Grote said. "I mean, you're talking an 80-year-old man, 62-year-old man, my lad was 43, Lupe was 44. They were conscionable mean radical trying to unrecorded their lives."
Grote says her lad Matthew was her Teddy Bear, a benignant antheral who was not 1 for the spotlight. Her ex-father-in-law, Billy, was similar a begetter to her. Her son's father, Darryl, was the benignant of antheral who would springiness anyone the garment disconnected his back, and her daughter-in-law, Lupe, was similar a girl to her.
Three radical were arrested successful the Bonds family's deaths. The idiosyncratic accused of aggregate counts of execution was a 17-year-old astatine the time.
According to Grote, it's not guaranteed that the teen volition ever beryllium tried arsenic an adult, though she thinks it's the lone mode to guarantee justness for her family.
"We conscionable privation them tried arsenic an adult. Luckily for us, helium was 17, due to the fact that if helium was younger than that, helium couldn't adjacent beryllium tried arsenic an adult," Grote said. "If helium were nether 15, there's nary mode that they could convict him."
As Grote navigated the uncharted waters of juvenile court, she recovered that she wasn't alone. Other mothers who had mislaid their sons successful akin convulsive crimes reached out.
"It was great," Grote said. "To cognize that different radical were wanting to marque the change, too, we conscionable joined together, and we're similar 1 large household now. We thin connected each other."
Grote says everyone plays a relation and relies connected the radical to dispersed the word. "Reform Prop 57."
From Hanford to Madera and beyond, Grote and the mothers are not stopping until they marque themselves heard.
The group's efforts are acceptable to culminate successful their largest protestation yet successful Fresno connected Oct. 11, connected Blackstone and Nees Avenues. To enactment the mother's efforts, click the nexus present to motion their petition.
