Do We Want to Release 58,000 More Like Lovelle Mixon?

Written by CA Political News on March 23, 2009, 11:20 AM

Gunman had spent years in and out of prison

Demian Bulwa, SF Chronicle 3/23/09

 Lovelle Mixon, the 26-year-old man who authorities say fatally shot four Oakland police officers before being killed, lived life on the margin. And he spent much of that life behind bars.

He dropped out of school in Oakland in the ninth grade, and at age 18 pleaded guilty to taking part in a gunpoint robbery in San Francisco, family members said.

He spent six years behind bars, in San Francisco County Jail and Corcoran State Prison, and he marked many of life's milestones while locked up, his family said. He married his childhood girlfriend while in San Francisco's jail in 2002.

After being paroled from prison in 2007, Mixon worked as a janitor for a low-income housing provider in Hayward, relatives said. They said he violated his parole once, earning him a further nine months in prison. He was paroled again last November.

Before his shooting spree, he was wanted for, once again, violating conditions of his parole. Family members said he didn't want to go back to prison.

They also said they were shocked at the brutality of the crime. They said prison had seemed to make him calmer and more respectful.

"It's like something you see on a movie or on TV, not in real life," said Mary Mixon, the gunman's paternal grandmother, who allowed him to stay with her until recently at her East Oakland home.

The modest home on Trask Street is in a neighborhood plagued by crime. And Mixon's family has seen its share of tragedy.

One of Mixon's younger sisters, 24-year-old Enjoli Mixon, lost her right eye in a shooting in May 2002 that killed one of her friends. A cousin, 15-year-old Derrick Mixon, was shot and killed in Oakland in July 2008.

"It's more than a little rough," Enjoli Mixon said. "You can't trust nobody. The cops, your friends. You can't trust yourself sometimes."

Mixon's loved ones offered condolences to the families of the dead officers. But some also made excuses for Mixon - saying the prison system failed him and that his parole officer didn't show up to appointments and cost him the chance to find a job.

According to relatives, Mixon and his older brother were brought to Oakland from Atlanta by their maternal grandmother, who had raised them and is now deceased, when Mixon was 14 years old. Mixon then went to Frick Middle School in Oakland, but never attended high school.

Mixon's wife, Amara Langston, a 25-year-old U.S. Army veteran who served 15 months in Iraq, lives in Newman (Stanislaus County). She said she and her husband lived apart because they were dealing with personal issues. The couple had no children.

Mixon's half sister, Reynete Mixon, said Mixon did not have any animosity toward police officers. "He didn't have no hate for them," she said. "He feared them as much as they feared him."