Sean Donnie Blackwell

Sean Blackwell, a 20-year-old man, died on August 31, 2007, in Baltimore, Maryland.

In the days that followed, his name appeared in a local report that listed several late-August homicide victims and placed his killing on Fairmount Street, a detail that anchored the loss to a specific block in the city. The entry was brief—just a date, a name, an age, and a street—but it hinted at how quickly a life can be reduced to a line item when violence stacks up week after week.

Beyond ...