Psalm 127:3 Lo, children are an heritage of the LORD…

To lose a child is the most devastating loss any mother can experience.  No other loss can compare to the anguish and the lasting hurt.  When my son’s life was taken so violently on November 1, 1999 by a faceless coward, our family’s life was forever shattered.  My son, Dayton, Ohio police officer Kevin Brame was 31 years old at the time of his murder, six years on the force and in the prime of his life.

My heart breaks at the horror of Kevin’s last moments. Eleven years have passed and his killer remains free!  We are launching this website to enlist your help in solving this heinous, pre-meditated murder.

We know that his murder was discussed, planned and carried out so that it would occur when Kevin would be vulnerable.  It was not a crime committed in the heat of passion or as an act of self-defense.  It was cold-blooded; it was brutal; and it has never been solved. My heart breaks at the horror of Kevin’s last moments. Eleven years have passed and his killer remains free!  We are launching this website to enlist your help in solving this heinous, pre-meditated murder.

Kevin was murdered by someone who knew where he would be at that time.  He may have watched as Kevin returned his two boys, Dominique and Tony, to the home of their mother, Carla.  Kevin and Carla had recently separated and were dissolving their five-year marriage.  The perpetrator positioned himself behind bushes near her house and waited.  When Kevin left just minutes later, the killer shot him from behind, afraid to face his unwitting victim.  Kevin had military and police training and he had his service weapon.  The killer knew this.  Kevin had to be killed before he had a chance to defend himself, as he surely would have… and quite well.  I use the masculine gender here, but the killer could just as well have been a woman.

Kevin spent the last week of his life working on the home he had rented just eight days before his death for himself and the boys.  When he left Carla’s house on the night he was killed, he was headed to his home to work on the basement.  All the rooms had been furnished except his bedroom; but for him, first things first.  The next pressing project was to put a hoop on the garage. He could crash on the sofa for a while.  He was very excited and looking forward to the boys spending their first weekend with him.  But, there was no joyous weekend with Dominique and Tony.  Family and friends instead had to pay their last respects to Kevin that Saturday.

Kevin was a good father.  And he was a good son and brother, a very decent and responsible man with many lifelong friends.  Not a day passes that Kevin’s absence is not felt, but never more poignantly than during family gatherings.  Our circle has been forever broken.  In quiet moments, I often wonder what Kevin’s life would be today, how he would have grown and how much fuller our lives would be.  Paraphrasing from Whittier,

“Of all sad words of tongue or pen,
The saddest are these:  What might have been!”

We pass through life encountering many types of experiences. One of the best is if we have the opportunity to, in some small way, share a child’s life. Kevin gave me such an opportunity and I am grateful.

When he was a young boy, Kevin would spend an occasional weekend with a family friend on his farm.  His Uncle Chuck spoke at Kevin’s funeral, “We pass through life encountering many types of experiences. One of the best is if we have the opportunity to, in some small way, share a child’s life. Kevin gave me such an opportunity and I am grateful. I’m grateful that he grew up to be a fine, upstanding man, a man with strong beliefs, beliefs for which he was willing to risk his life every day.  Dear Lord, we thank you for sharing Kevin with us and ask that you give us many more like him.”

I hope you will come to know Kevin through the photos, articles and videos on this website. This crime should be a high profile case, but I’m guessing most of you have never heard of it.  Our attempts to get national attention have not been particularly successful.  So, we are turning to you because we are certain there are people out there who know why Kevin was killed and who was involved in his murder.  We desperately need your help.  Kevin deserves justice, too long denied.

If you can help solve my son’s murder, please share your information on the contact page.  You can remain anonymous if you’d like; however, you could receive a cash reward up to $100,000 if that information leads to an arrest and conviction of the person or persons responsible for Kevin’s murder.  They don’t deserve one more day of freedom.