After losing her teenage son in an unsolved murder, “I don't feel like I'm alive,” mom says

Amari McFadden-Sowers would have done anything for his “boys” — close friends who the 18-year-old Penbrook native considered family.

That's why he didn't hesitate to take an Uber to Harrisburg when one of his childhood friends called him late in the evening of December 19, 2023 and said he was in trouble and needed help.

But it was a trap.

Amari was lured to an alley in Allison Hill where he was shot nine times, including twice in the back, his mother told PennLive. A woman found his body around 3 a.m. the next day as she went to work.

Almost ten months later, there have been no arrests in the case. Amari's murder is one of four unsolved murders last year and five so far this year. The families of these victims find it difficult to move on, knowing that someone took their loved one's life without being held accountable.

The discovery of Amari's body marked the end of a long battle waged by his mother, Marilyn McFadden, to keep her son on the right path and away from negative influences in Harrisburg.

“I don’t feel like I’m alive at the moment. I exist,” she said, her voice cracking. “Every day I wake up and I’m angry that I have to go through this. It’s a lot to process and deal with on your own.”

On Christmas Day, five days after Amari's murder, McFadden, 45, was at home planning his funeral when she suffered a massive stroke. The left side of her body remains paralyzed and doctors told her she would likely never regain full mobility.

She walks with a cane and has a housekeeper who helps her around the house and with errands. The stroke forced McFadden to miss Amari's funeral.

“It's a complete change in her life,” said Freddye McFadden, Marilyn's mother and Amari's grandmother. “Most of my grief now goes to Marilyn because it makes such a big difference to her. She lost her independence and her lifestyle.”

The grief is especially painful knowing that there are people who know what happened to Amari but have not spoken out – especially his closest friends, Amari's family said.

“He cared very deeply about his friends or who he thought his friends were,” Freddye McFadden said. “He often had the wrong friends.”

Amari's friends made his family feel bad long before he was found dead in the alley. Marilyn said the group seemed to condone and encourage Amari's bad behavior.

“You are surrounded by snakes,” she told Amari during a violent fight shortly before he left his home for good in June 2023, six months before his death.

In 2023, Amari had dropped out of high school and was regularly crashing into friends' houses to avoid his mother's rules, including the home curfew.

“Stay out of Harrisburg. They’re dropping bodies in Harrisburg,” McFadden said when she told him. “He knew better because I told him better.”

She said Amari was 14 when he first ran away from home and sought refuge with friends' parents, who allowed their children to stay outside until midnight or later.

When he ran away, he stopped taking medication for mental health issues and never started again. Months later, he was back home but continued to disappear for days, Marilyn said.

Amari resisted Marilyn's attempts to keep him focused on school and long-term goals, she said. At one point, feeling overwhelmed, she asked a judge overseeing a probation violation hearing to send Amari to a juvenile detention center.

In custody: “I know where he is, I know he is eating. At least I know he’s alive,” she said.

“She did her best to keep him away from things,” Freddye said. “The more she tried to keep him away, the more he was inclined to do it.”

For Marilyn, as a single mother of three, watching the Amari spiral was particularly frustrating. She worked multiple jobs at times to ensure she could give her sons and daughter what they needed.

“I didn’t want my kids to be a statistic,” she said. “I didn’t want my kids to ever ask me for anything and I couldn’t get it.”

Since Amari's death, Marilyn has founded the A Mother's Cry Foundation, a Harrisburg-based group that aims to support the families of victims of urban homicides. But she continues to struggle with her own grief and the unanswered questions surrounding her son's murder.

Marilyn tries to look back on the fond memories she has of Amari growing up in Penbrook with his older brother and younger sister.

Amari was a “high-maintenance” child with thick, curly hair that fell down his back when wet, his mother said. After washing his hair, she massaged in hot oil and moisturizer and brushed it out for him. He usually wore a face mask while his mother did his hair, she said.

“He went to Ulta with me and got just as much stuff as I did,” she said.

Amari loved dancing and singing, especially at family gatherings. His family formed a circle around him and shouted “Go Amari” to cheer him on as he tried to breakdance, McFadden said. The 18-year-old was also a talented basketball player and a fast runner.

He was charming when he wanted to be, and also a daredevil, climbing trees and jumping off playground equipment without fear.

Freddye said Amari was well-read and often seemed bored at school because of his high intelligence. On a year-long field trip to the Army War College in Carlisle, he impressed a general with his knowledge of the aircraft and helicopters on display.

“If he had lived, he would have come a long way,” Freddye said.

Marilyn said she did what she could to continue to support Amari after he left home permanently in the summer of 2023. She made a habit of carrying packages of socks and underwear—items that Amari never seemed to have enough of—as she moved between friends' houses.

The night Amari died, McFadden was awake and unable to sleep. Hours later, a Harrisburg police officer knocked on her door and asked to talk to her about Amari.

“Just tell me my son is alive,” she said.

“No,” he replied, shaking his head.

When Marilyn McFadden came home from the hospital after her stroke, she found three packs of underwear in her closet that she was never able to give him. Every morning she kisses his urn and tells him she loves him.

“I don’t have that many years left on this earth. “It would be nice to see someone pay the price for the crime that was committed,” Freddye McFadden said. “Maybe I’m not here to see it.”

Harrisburg police have released few details about Amari's murder. Lt. Kyle Gautsch said the investigation is ongoing and police are asking anyone with information to come forward. Anyone with information can call police at 717-558-6900 or submit a tip through CrimeWatch.

Amari's murder was Harrisburg's 14th homicide of 2023.