In the early morning hours of Thursday, April 11, 2013, the life of 35-year-old Sheico Delbar, a Black male, was tragically cut short on the streets of New Orleans. A native of Ethiopia, Delbar had moved to the Crescent City five years prior in pursuit of a better life for his family, whom he supported from thousands of miles away while working as a taxi driver.
He was a husband and a father to two young children, a three-year-old and a one-and-a-half-year-old, who remained in his home country.
Just after 1 a.m. in the Tremé neighborhood, merely three blocks from his home, Delbar was shot multiple times. He had just completed his shift with American Taxi and was not carrying any passengers at the time of the incident. After being shot, his taxi crashed into a tree in the 900 block of North Johnson Street. When police responded to the report of a car crash, they discovered Delbar inside his vehicle, where he was pronounced dead at the scene. The Orleans Parish Coroner's Office later confirmed his death was a homicide resulting from gunshot wounds.
In the wake of the shooting, friends and colleagues described Delbar as a wonderful and hardworking man who was deeply devoted to his family. His dream of being reunited with them was close to becoming a reality, as he had already purchased a plane ticket to visit them after the city's upcoming Jazz Fest and was in the process of arranging for his wife and children to join him in New Orleans. His taxicab was equipped with a security camera, and the footage from the device was turned over to homicide detectives for investigation.
Despite the initial investigation and the availability of potential evidence from the taxi's security camera, there have been no publicly reported arrests or identification of any suspects in the murder of Sheico Delbar in the years that have followed. The case remains a painful and unresolved chapter for his friends and the local cabbie community, who mourned the senseless loss of one of their own. His death highlighted the dangers faced by taxi drivers in the city and left a family continents away to grieve a husband and father they would never see again.
