Mom of Slain 9-Year-Old: 'Stop the Hatred'

Born on Sept. 11, 2001, Christina-Taylor Green came into the world in the midst of a national tragedy, and she left it yesterday, an innocent bystander in the hail of bullets that cut down Gabrielle Giffords. Mom Roxanna Green gave an emotional interview with MSNBC this morning, reports Politico, noting that Christina had been featured in a book called Faces of Hope. "I just want her memory to live on, she's a face of hope, a face of change," Green said. "Stop the violence, stop the hatred."

Green added that she thought Christina had been hurt in a car wreck when her neighbor, who had taken Christina to meet Giffords, called to say they were on the way to the hospital. The 9-year-old was shot in the chest, and did not survive. “They tried to save her but she just couldn’t make it…I saw her right after that. I spent a lot of time with her, and I said goodbye to her," said Green. The AP notes that Christina was the granddaughter of former baseball great and Phillies manager Dallas Green—and the only girl on her softball team.
(More Gabrielle Giffords stories.)