MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Memphis’ last housing development, Foote Homes, sits right across from a new development, Cleaborn Pointe at Heritage Landing. Sunday, a woman who lives at Cleaborn’s Senior High Rise got caught in gunfire.
“I heard a ringing in my ear. I panicked. I didn’t know whether to go to the floor,” Mattie Nelson said.
The ringing Nelson heard Sunday night was from a gunshot outside her apartment building at the Cleaborn Pointe Senior High Rise.
The bullet hole in her living room window is reminder of the close call.
Nelson said she was sitting here on the sofa when the gunshot hit the window. All she could do is lean over and wait for the gunshots to stop.
Luckily she wasn’t hit.
“I just start saying thank you Lord. Thank you Lord,” Nelson said.
A bullet did lodge in the wall right above her refrigerator.
“I had no idea it had landed in the kitchen. I didn’t know where it had landed,” Nelson said.
Add her to the list of citizens no longer feeling safe about where they live. She and others said shooting is constant at the Foote Homes Housing Development across the street.
“It’s like a war zone,” Lori Presley, another resident, said. She heard gun shots just last night.
“Six rounds. Then a pair of six more rounds. I turned my lights off and went to the bedroom window,” she said.
Foote Homes has its share of problems, and even residents complain about the crime.
The Memphis Housing Authority has plans to tear the place down and rebuild starting this year, but these seniors don’t want to wait around.
“I no longer feel safe. I have been trying to move out of here,” Nelson said. “This was new to me. Now it scared me beyond measure. I don’t feel comfortable no more.”
Nelson called police, who filled out a report on the shooting.
