On the evening of July 3, 2011, 22-year-old Braheem Curtis was among a small group at Ninth and Kirkwood Streets in Wilmington when an argument over nearby fireworks escalated. Neighbors say 22-year-old Sirron Benson confronted Curtis, warned him to stop or he would get his gun, walked away, then returned moments later with his arm raised and fired. Curtis was struck in the chest and fell; a second shot was fired while he lay motionless. He was taken to Christiana Hospital and died from exsanguination due to a gunshot wound to the thoracic aorta. A second bullet was recovered at autopsy.
A resident reported seeing a man in blue jeans and a white T-shirt run by and toss what looked like a black gun onto a roof; police recovered a .45-caliber Ruger Blackhawk there. Forensics found projectiles compatible with that type of revolver and DNA on the weapon that included Benson’s profile among at least three others. Benson was arrested August 16, 2011, charged with First-Degree Murder and a related firearms count, and convicted after an April 2013 trial; the jury returned guilty verdicts and the court imposed a life sentence plus a consecutive twenty years at Level V.
Does anyone have information about Curtis’s last hours, or memories of the neighborhood that night?
