PINE HILLS, Fla. — One year ago Thursday, three people were killed and two others were injured in a series of shootings in Pine Hills.

Keith Moses has been charged in the case and is accused of killing 9-year-old T’Yonna Majors, 38-year-old Natacha Augustin and Spectrum News 13 journalist Dylan Lyons on Feb. 22, 2023.

Spectrum News 13 photojournalist Jesse Walden and T’Yonna’s mother were also injured in the shootings.

Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty against Moses, who faces first-degree murder and attempted first-degree murder charges. At the last court hearing in January, a judge found him competent to stand trial with a date to hear the case tentatively set for this summer.

The shootings personally affected Spectrum News 13. His position in Orlando was only Lyons' second job as a TV journalist, and his career was really just beginning. A graduate of the University of Central Florida, those around him say Lyons embraced being a journalist.

Jesse Walden, who was also injured that day, worked closely with Lyons and remembers that he loved being a journalist, that he loved talking to people and being able to give a voice to the voiceless, and to hold people in power accountable, because he felt the public had a right to know.

One day after the deadly shootings in Pine Hills, Orange County Mayor Jerry Demings reconvened the Citizen’s Safety Task force, charging the group with looking at prior recommendations and amending them to further reduce gun violence in the county.

Since its inception, the county has earmarked $2 million a year to go toward task force efforts.

After a careful review of those records, Spectrum News found a lot of the money, hundreds of thousands of dollars, going to two programs: Credible Messengers and The Boys and Girls Club of Central Florida.

Credible Messengers

Youth in Ocoee have a special place to call their home away from home. It’s called the CLIC or The Community Life Improvement Center, a nonprofit with a mission to develop the most undervalued groups of people in society, for the purpose of cultivating underserved communities in an innovative way, according to the organization’s website.

It was there that Spectrum News met groups of community youth engaged in fighting, but it’s not a fight fueled with aggression. It is a competitive sport, the youth in the Ocoee area benefiting from Orange County’s Credible Messenger program.

The initiative is a viable outlet and resource for youth in what the county considers some of its most troubled areas. The program, funded by the county since 2021, received more than $300,000 in the last two fiscal years and more than $40,000 its first year.

Ruben Saldaña, or coach, as he is affectionally called, heads up the Orange County Credible Messengers as a consultant.

“We are in Pine Hills, Oakridge and OBT, Americana Texas, Parramore, Eastside Orlando,” Saldaña said.  

Saldaña said the program is ever important — running Credible Messengers and his own group, Gloves Up Guns Down, is a way to rescue youth like Jean Foster from a life of crime on the streets.

“It’s mostly gang violence, shootings and stuff like that," Foster said. "It’s not like a good role model."

Foster said he is grateful for the program, which acts as a resource to him and others.

“I brought all my friends into it, because I knew what he was doing, he was helping the community, helping everybody,” he said of Saldaña.

“We are open to anybody, but we are looking for the 1-percenter, the roughest of the roughest, the shooters," Saldaña said. "The ones that are not in the YMCA club, they are not in The Boys and Girls Club, they are not in the after-school programs. Because, unfortunately, most of them dropped out of school."

With similar programs in New York City and Washington, D.C., the Orange County Credible Messengers is made up of 40 positions. About 15 are active right now, but Saldaña says more are in the process of being trained. Since being funded by the county, he said more than 100 students have been impacted by the program.

“I was working in these hoods before there was even a mayor’s task force," Saldaña said. "I didn’t even ask to be on this task force. A commissioner gave up her seat and ask permission to put me there. I didn’t care about a task force because I was going to do this work regardless, but now with resources, I’m able to hold our Credible Messengers mentors accountable."

Boys and Girls Club of Central Florida

Accountability is also important to people like Jamie Merrill, who serves as the President and CEO of The Boys and Girls Club of Central Florida. Members of the Orange County Citizen’s Safety Task Force say they see her group as another important crime fighting resource — one that has received more than $300,000 in county funds in the last three fiscal years.

“In my opinion, there is no better use than to invest in our youth, and more specifically, we are more focused and aimed at not only reaching the kids that already attend the clubs with us, but those that don’t," Merrill said. "Giving them safe spaces, so they can start attending and being encouraged so they are not out potentially getting into trouble or engaging into unhealthy activity on those evenings and weekends when we are not open."

Merill said the county funds are used for the Save Our Students, or S.O.S., program.

The initiative is a series of after-hours club sessions for youth, typically from 6-9 p.m. on Fridays and Saturdays. Last year, Merrill said The Boys and Girls Club did 40 events at 10 different clubs, serving over 2,100 students — the most since county funds have been pumped into the program.

In 2022, more than 1,600 students benefited, and in 2021, more than 600 students took part in the growing Boys & Girls club initiative.  

Many of the resources were focused in the Pine Hills community following the Feb. 22 shootings last year.

“That day, that moment, was devastating for our community, for our kids, for their families, everybody around us," Merrill said. "So yes, the Save Our Students initiative partnered with the county and has done a great deal to be able to bring awareness around teens, specifically between the ages of 13 and 18, and helping them find healthy mechanisms."

Crime in Orange County

Looking at numbers Spectrum News obtained from the Orange County Sheriff’s Office, since the formation of the Citizen’s Safety Task Force, numbers for violent crimes like robberies, battery or assault and sex crimes in the county are down from three years ago, while the number of murders is up slightly over that same time period.

Spectrum News asked Danny Banks, Orange County's deputy county administrator for public safety, if he believed Task Force efforts and financial investments have made a difference, especially in light of the slight increase in county homicide numbers.

Banks returned a statement saying, “We should not speculate as to the impact of the task force funding on specific crimes. For example, although the homicide rate has increased slightly, robbery rates have dropped dramatically. One thing we can say for certain, Orange County government is working to make sure programs and strategies are in place to reduce and prevent gun violence and violent crime. We are making investments where none previously existed, and we believe those investments serve all of us in our combined goal of reducing violence in our community.”  

Accountability

Spectrum News also asked Banks about tax payer money used to fund the Citizens Safety Task Force efforts and whether it is being used effectively.

“We have some measures of accountability within them that are performance-based measures that we want to ensure that the taxpayer money, our own individual money, is being invested into something that is touching people," he said. "So every one of the contracts we have, every entity who is receiving money from Orange County, has to live up to the expectations in which they applied for the money"

"We don’t want to set them up for failure," he added. "We want to set them up for success."

Working to make a difference 

Foster said young adults like him serve as living proof that the efforts are paying off.

“I really, really appreciate that," he said. "Like seeing someone looking out for the community, especially the Black community, that really met my heart.”

He says he will continue to participate in, and give back to programs like Credible Messengers. And Foster said he’s grateful for people like Ruben Saldaña, who helped get him on the right track at an early age.

One area that nonprofits and community stakeholders say they have the most challenge is working with parents in the area. Spectrum News recently asked Mayor Jerry Demings his take on how to solve this program.

“We don’t have all of the answers, but our goal is to get parents more engaged through our neighborhood centers for families and the programmatic pieces that we are putting place through the county,” he said.

See Orange County Mayor Jerry Demmings' full interview: