'They are literally taking our future away from us': Family seeks leads in North Versailles hayride killing

Shantel Pizaro wonders how her daughter will be able to get through a birthday without her twin brother by her side.

After 15 years of birthdays together, 16 will be bittersweet.

“How can she have a birthday every year with her twin, and now one of the biggest birthdays they have coming up, 16, she no longer has her twin brother by her side?”

It is one of so many milestones Pizaro will miss with her son, Steven Eason Jr., who was shot and killed at a haunted hayride attraction last month in North Versailles. Friends told police they saw an acquaintance involved in a confrontation with the suspect, so they went to try to calm the situation.

Police have said the suspect pulled and gun and opened fire, hitting Eason and the acquaintance he’d been trying to help. Investigators said there were up to 100 people in the vicinity when the suspect — believed to be a teenager between 15 and 17 himself — opened fire.

Eason’s parents said it was like him to want to defuse a confrontation.

Gathered with other family members outside the Allegheny County Police headquarters in Green Tree on Friday, his parents pleaded for answers. Eason was a student at Central Catholic High School in Oakland.

“Our baby is gone,” Pizaro said. “And we’re here still left with this pain and this hurt. I would not wish this on any parent.”

She pointed to the fact the suspect fired into a group of children.

“It could have been any of your children,” she said, speaking to the parents of other teens and children who were at the Haunted Hills Hayride that night. She asked for anyone who was there to turn over any cellphone photos or video they might have taken, even if it seems like it wouldn’t be helpful.

“Anything from that night,” she said. “You may see someone in the background that may not have been with your group of people — anything.”

Eason is among the more than a dozen children killed by gun violence in Pittsburgh and the rest of Allegheny County this year — a year which has seen shootings and homicides rise as the pandemic wears on.

Marcus Gibson, 15, was killed playing with a gun in January. Ahmir Tuli, 18, was shot and killed outside his mother’s Strip District restaurant, allegedly by a man angry he’d been tossed from the bar. Braya Sanders, a toddler, was shot by another child in her Monroeville home. Tyjuan Malachi was killed April 8 in NOothview Heights, and Kenneth Hairston was killed the next day in Sheraden — both were 18. Don Angelo Castapheny, 15, was shot and killed the same month, as were Levar Green and Isaiah Freeman, both 17.

In May, shootings killed Daymeir Boyd, Darin Hobdy, Jason Jackson Jr. and Izeyah Clancy. All were 17.

Christian Redinger, 15, was shot in Brookline in June, and Dontae McKenith a month later in McKeesport. Robert Cade died in August in Homewood.

“I would see different things and different children lose their life,” Pizaro said of the epidemic of gun violence. “I would say, ‘I can’t imagine the pain that mother is going through, I can’t imagine the pain — I pray for them, I pray for them, I pray for them.’ Now I’m part of this club.

“I wouldn’t wish this on anyone.”

And so she marks time, unable to sleep, she says, and she thinks about the milestones her son will miss.

“I can’t even put into words how I feel — to live with my baby every day for 15 years, to see how much he’s accomplished, to know that I’ll never be able to see certain milestones,” she said.

She named them: Homecoming, prom, his Sweet 16, graduation from Central Catholic. He was looking forward to getting a job — he had his eye on the Taco Bell in Penn Hills. In August, he went on a retreat to Slippery Rock University and brought home paperwork. Though only 15, he thought he might want to go to school for business.

It’s hard to sleep, Pizaro said, knowing the person who killed her son continues to walk free.

“Any of our children can be next. We want to prevent anyone’s family from going through this type of pain,” she said. “Our children are our future, and they are literally taking our future away from us.”

She begged for the adults to stand up as leaders.

“We want to build a good foundation in our children. We want to teach them honesty, good morals,” she said. “Come forward with anything you may have. Please. Anything may help.”