Wilkinsburg victims 'loved the joy of life,' mother says

Jessica Shelton will remember the good times, she said, but knows they will never be the same.

“Anything could be a holiday for us — sunny day, rainy day — we make anything a holiday, especially holidays,” she said.

The unseasonably warm weather March 9 was a holiday, as Jessica Shelton and her friends and family gathered at her daughter's home in Wilkinsburg for a backyard cookout. Jessica Shelton left early, about two hours before two men gunned down five people in a hail of bullets.

She lost two daughters, a son, a niece, a friend and an unborn grandson in the shooting, for which there have been no arrests.

“I'm going to miss them,” she said. “I'm just going to miss them.”

Jerry Micheal Shelton

As the oldest brother, 35-year-old Jerry Shelton — Micheal, to his family — loved to dole out advice.

“If you needed to talk at any time, you could call him, and he'd pick up the phone and listen — anything you wanted to talk about,” his mother said.

She said when her children were younger, he often complained the younger ones wouldn't listen to him.

“He said, ‘They'll never listen to my advice.' I told him, ‘One day, they'll hear you — believe me,' ” she said.

He loved to learn, and had dreams of becoming a marine biologist when he was a child. As an adult, he built saltwater fish tanks and had exotic fish. He worked for Uber, UPMC and the Jewish Association.

“He wanted a lot for his children, and so he worked three jobs to provide for his family,” she said. “He was just a mild-mannered, happy person. He was joyful.”

Brittany Powell

Brittany Powell, 27, was in the midst of opening a beauty shop in the area, and she wanted her sisters to help her.

“She wanted Micheal to have a room in the back where he could build his saltwater tanks and open a small business doing that,” Jessica Shelton said. “She wanted to have a family business.”

She had a daughter, Tamorra. An older daughter, Taylor, died in 2013.

“Everything she did was for those two,” she said.

Jessica Shelton's youngest son, 24-year-old LaMont, who remains in critical condition after being shot multiple times in the shooting, had a particularly strong bond with Tamorra, she said. LaMont performed CPR on the child when she fell out of a window once, saving the girl's life.

Chanetta Powell

Anyone in Chanetta Powell's line of sight was her friend.

“She was the type of person — you could talk to her about anything,” Jessica Shelton said. “She could relate to any situation you were going through.”

She told a story of how Chanetta, 25, had looked at her 8-month-old daughter several weeks ago and said, “OK, Chloe, I'm going to have to get you a bus pass, and you can take yourself to day care.”

She loved to make people laugh, she said.

“When she walked in a room, everybody would be like, ‘Chanetta! Chanetta!' because she was so funny,” her mother said. “She always had a joke.”

She loved her two children, too, and had a third on the way, Jessica Shelton said.

“She had a sense of fashion about her, and she wanted her kids in a certain type of fashion,” she said. “She said the way her kids look reflects on her. She put a lot into her children — she put a whole lot into her children.”

Tina Shelton

“Tina — she was like Micheal,” Jessica Shelton said. “She had several jobs and worked for her kids to make sure they had the best of everything.”

Tina, 37, had five children, and she worked for more than two decades at ManorCare nursing home in Shadyside. She also worked at nursing homes in Squirrel Hill and Monroeville.

She loved watching her children play sports, and her life revolved around making sure they had good lives, she said.

“When all of us would get together — like Tina, Brittany, Chanetta, Micheal, Monty — we all would just laugh and joke and reminisce on funny things that have happened,” Jessica Shelton said. “They were each others' best friends.”

Shada Mahone

“If you saw Brittany, you saw Shada,” Jessica Shelton said of her daughter and her best friend. “They were inseparable. The bond they had was incredible.”

She said that Shada, 26, would stop at Brittany's house each morning before work, just to make sure they were able to talk to each other that day.

“It was just surprising how they had to see each other every day,” she said.

Jessica Shelton said she'd known Shada since she was about six months old.

“She was a beautiful young lady,” she said. “She's a niece to me because when you grow up with somebody, you become a close family. It's like your second family.”

Family was the most important part of all their lives, Jessica Shelton said.

“They were just family,” she said. “They were close. They loved celebrating life — the joy of life. They wanted their kids to be able to experience the joy they had in their hearts.”

Funeral services for Brittany Powell of Wilkinsburg, Jerry Shelton of Hazelwood and Chanetta Powell of Homewood will be held 11 a.m. Tuesday at the Lighthouse Cathedral in Pittsburgh's St. Clair neighborhood. A service for Tina Shelton of Wilkinsburg was Saturday, and a service for Shada Mahone of Homewood was March 14.

Megan Guza is a Tribune-Review staff writer. Reach her at 412-380-8519 or mguza@tribweb.com.