The Robinson family once looked forward to Sundays. It was the day they would gather with dozens of relatives and friends to eat, laugh, and catch up. “Sunday was the day that we cherished the most,” said RoShanda Robinson, the oldest child in the family.
That rhythm ended abruptly in the fall of 2020.
On the morning of Nov. 8 — a Sunday — André Robinson Jr., whom the family called “Lil Dre,” was shot and killed while dropping off breakfast at his girlfriend’s home in Oakland, California. He was 19.
In the nearly six years since, the four surviving Robinson siblings say they have been pulled apart by grief they have struggled to process. André Jr. had been the glue who held them together, they said — the one who eased tense situations with a combination of silliness and wisdom. “He was one of my closest friends,” RoShanda said. “It was always a dull moment with him. He always had a smile on his face.”
“When my brother died, it separated us,” said JaDen Robinson, who was 12 when André Jr. was killed. “My sisters, they all got separated. My brothers, they all separated. My mama used to be happy, but now she’s not happy. My dad was a playful dad, and it’s not there any more.”
JaDen recalls talking to his older brother on the phone the night before the killing. “I’m going to come pick you up,” André Jr. had told him. The next day, his mother came into the house screaming and crying; she told him his brother was dead.
After the killing, JaDen became withdrawn. The immense pain, he said, was compounded by a sense of invisibility amid the family’s whirlwind of grief — dealing with police and homicide detectives, making funeral arrangements. “I was pushed away,” he said.
De’Andraney Robinson, 28, one of the middle sisters, described André Jr. as her best friend. She said she can still picture the day he was killed but struggles to put the experience into words. “I didn’t want sympathy, I was just angry and mad and I just wanted to do something about it. I was angry as fuck,” she said.
A rift developed between De’Andraney and her mother over who they believed was responsible for the killing. After the funeral, De’Andraney said she went four months without speaking to her mother. She said she is now mostly estranged from her parents, with the exception of family gatherings to commemorate André Jr.’s birthday and