On March 18, 2023, Milwaukee police officers responded to a 911 call and discovered Kayla F. Calderon, an 18-year-old high school student two months short of graduation, dead in a bedroom chair, with a gun on the bed nearby. The slight teen, who weighed just 109 pounds, had a gunshot wound to the right side of her head, a “close contact shot.” Her right eye and cheek were swollen and bruised. It was a gruesome scene, and the man who found her, her relatively new boyfriend, had a disturbing history.
For almost three years, Kayla’s mom, Iris Miranda, has pursued justice in her daughter’s case, disputing any claim that Kayla, who wanted to be a veterinarian, might have taken her own life. The mother says she even went undercover to gather information about the suspect and to determine whether he is involved in a Vice Lords-linked street gang, by “taking a job as a Lyft driver within the community where he lives.” In fact, Miranda was so dogged in her pursuit that the leading suspect in the case eventually obtained a restraining order preventing Miranda from talking about him on social media and having any contact with him. He also picked up a felony drug dealing conviction in Waukesha County while the case languished in Milwaukee… and languished.
“I am seeing where criminals are provided more lenience and rights than those that they have harmed in Milwaukee County, and it concerns not only myself but a long list of families that are facing the same tragedy of losing a family member to gun violence and not getting the help we need to keep the community safe,” Miranda says.
Miranda wrote Attorney General Josh Kaul and asked him to get involved because she was unhappy with Milwaukee police, to no avail. She met with the DA. She has even conducted videotaped interviews. A witness told Miranda in a video that she allegedly saw the suspect wielding a gun a week before Calderon’s death. “He came out, and he had the gun, and he looked at me.” The witness alleged that she saw the man “hitting her, abusing her (Calderon). Then he left. He stormed off. He was going to kill her.” Wisconsin Right Now has reviewed this video, as well as reports that show Milwaukee police have an alleged confession and text messages, allegedly from the suspect, that say the following:…