Neighbors say Herring brothers seen as positive role models

SILVER SPRING, Md. (Map, News) - Longmead Crossing community members say they lost a lot when 18-year-old Jeremy Herring and 20-year-old Justin Herring were found dead of apparent gunshot wounds Monday morning.

Neighbors said Tuesday the Silver Spring area lost two reliable snow-shovelers and lawn-mowers, two guys who would help women with their bags and walk younger kids to the pool.

And nearby parents said they lost a role model when they learned Montgomery County police believe 44-year-old Thurmon Herring shot his sons to death inside the family home on the 14900 block of Dinsdale Drive. Herring was being held Tuesday without bail in the Montgomery County Detention Center.

“I heard he was really strict, but I thought it was a good thing because those boys had turned out so well,” neighbor Delores McQueen said. “It’s just so crazy. Why try to raise them right just to turn around and kill them?”

Teenagers and neighbors dropped by the family’s home Tuesday to leave cards and flowers.

“[Jeremy] didn’t drink, he didn’t smoke, nothing,” said Jeremy’s girlfriend, 17-year-old Shauniqua Hunte. “Outside of basketball, he worked at Lady Footlocker and he spent time with me.”

Neighbors said Justin was a cashier at a pool in Olney and attended Montgomery College. Family members inside the home, who declined to be identified by name, said Justin, whose MySpace alias was “Choirboy,” was “a good kid, a quiet kid.”

And Jeremy’s John F. Kennedy High basketball coach, Diallo Nelson, said the same of his parents.

“The mom and dad were there every game,” Nelson said. “They always made sure Jeremy and Justin were provided for, they never were needing nothing, they gave rides everywhere the kids needed to be, they were very involved. That what’s makes this so hard to believe.”

Nelson said Jeremy, a 6-foot-2-inch guard who led Montgomery County in scoring last season , was traveling to Quinnipiac University in Connecticut soon to consider a scholarship there.

Neighbor Jeffrey Harris said he thinks Thurmon Herring might have snapped in anticipation of the boys moving out.

“My opinion is he didn’t want those boys out of his home,” Harris said.

Harris said Thurmon Herring would often come looking for his kids, even if they were just down the block at a barbecue.

“He was very tight with his kids, maybe too disciplined,” Harris said.

Yet Harris said he had tried to emulate Thurmon’s parenting and told his children to use Justin and Jeremy as role models.

“I said, ‘Look how he raised his kids, we should do ours the same way,’ ” Harris said. “Now it seems like everything he taught us, he went against it all.”

kmiller@dcexaminer.com

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