Bolon Xi-Amaru wakes up each morning and searches for signs of movement on legislation his family urgently wants Maryland lawmakers to pass — a hearing, a vote, a text from a lawmaker.

The 33-year-old from West Baltimore has become his family’s lead advocate in Annapolis for the last four years, lobbying to pass bills in memory of his cousin, NyKayla Strawder. Strawder, 15, was fatally shot in August 2022 by a 9-year-old with access to his grandmother’s gun.

They’re pitching two bills that they believe may prevent similar deaths, mandating treatment for kids like the 9-year-old and stiffening penalties for adults who fail to secure firearms.

Xi-Amaru takes time off from work and travels from Baltimore for hearings and to lobby key members, sometimes by bus, and waits hours in crowded committee rooms to give two minutes of testimony.

The family’s legislative journey has dragged on years longer than he expected, and their attempts have hit a series of obstacles. This year, their bills have become entangled in Baltimore politics.

Pieces of the bills have been embraced by political rivals — one of whom is facing federal charges — providing a glimpse at what could be the General Assembly’s most contentious primary.

Xi-Amaru said it’s been hard to tell who is trying to do right by NyKayla.

“The politics just beat you down,” Xi-Amaru said. “And I can’t never tell if people are being honest with me, or if they’re just talking me in circles.”

Years of starting over

After NyKayla was killed, the family wanted to prevent other families from going through what they did.

With the help of then-Sen. Jill Carter, the family in 2023 drafted and introduced two bills. One would help kids get treatment. They named this bill after NyKayla.

The second bill added a prison sentence and steeper fine for adults who fail to secure firearms around children — one of three charges leveled at April Gaskins, the grandmother of the boy who shot NyKayla. A conviction carried only a $1,000 fine. Gaskins was convicted on two other charges and sentenced to four years in prison.

Neither bill passed.

They tried again in 2024. That year, lawmakers cut and pasted the social services bill named for NyKayla into a sweeping juvenile reform package. But the family — worried the omnibus law would mean more kids would becom eentangled in the legal system — asked lawmakers to strip NyKayla’s name. Later that year, they lost their legislative champion when Carter took a job in the Moore administration.

They were back at the starting line.

Del. Malcolm Ruff, at Carter’s request, picked up the bill focused on services for kids. Sen. Dalya Attar, at the request of Baltimore State’s Attorney Ivan Bates, her former boss, revived a version of the penalty bill.

Both represent District 41 covering West and Northwest Baltimore. The majority Black district is also home to a large Jewish population. Attar was appointed to the Senate seat over Ruff following Carter’s resignation.

Ruff, who is Black, is challenging Attar, an Orthodox Jew, in the Democratic primary, a breach that has cost him allies in the General Assembly.

Meanwhile, Attar is facing serious legal challenges. The former prosecutor pleaded not guilty in November to federal extortion and conspiracy charges. Prosecutors say Attar and two accomplices secretly recorded her former political consultant having sex with a married man and then threatened to expose their affair.

Ruff, who said he has not spoken to Attar in months, acknowledged the layers of complication faced by the Strawder family this year.

“I do feel bad if the family has the sense that they’re being used as a political football,” he said. “That was never my intent.”

Attar did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

Two bills, two different receptions

Xi-Amaru attended hearings for both Ruff’s and Attar’s bills and said he noticed a difference in how they were received.

Lawmakers reacted positively to Ruff’s bill, he said. But the mood was different during Attar’s hearing. He said he was upset that Attar couldn’t recount the history of the bill and that colleagues were skeptical.

The charges addressed by Attar’s bill rarely stick, according to an independent analysis of judiciary data. Between July 2024 and June 2025, there was one conviction out of 51 charges in District Court and two convictions out of 39 charges in circuit court.

Why add prison time on to a charge the judge rejected in the Gaskins case and is rarely successfully prosecuted, lawmakers asked?

Attar, a former prosecutor, and Baltimore Assistant State’s Attorney Jennifer Brady, who tried the Gaskins case, told senators the penalty would act as a deterrent and teaching point for gun owners.

“How does an increase in penalty educate such a person?” asked Republican Sen. Mike McKay.

Brady told The Banner that she has been in contact with the family about the bill. The steeper the consequences, the more leverage prosecutors would have during plea bargaining, said Brady, who works for Bates.

“I would have felt way more confident going into this prosecution, because I would have had at least five years to work with on that count,” she said.

Attar said during the hearing the bill marked the first time she “managed to get both sides of the aisle to not like or question a bill.”

Xi-Amaru said the family supports Attar’s bill, though the language of the law itself may need to change before adding a penalty.

“Our concern is that [Attar’s] bill speaks to giving five years for something that, in our case, they couldn’t prove,” Xi-Amaru said.

Policy from pain

While Attar’s bill focuses on penalties, Ruff said his bill requires the state to look at the child’s circumstances and help them.

“The moment we see a kid under 13 years old involved in an incident that results in someone’s death, something’s not right here,” said Ruff, a civil rights attorney.

The 9-year-old in this case has culpability, Ruff said, but the child wouldn’t have been able to do what he did if not for his environment.

“A situation like this could cause a kid to be lost forever, right?” he said. “We want to hold on to as many kids as we can.”

The Strawder family wants to prevent a cycle of violence and retribution and create pathways to healing in their community, he said.

“I cannot imagine having the foresight and the heart to say, ‘What about the kid who actually committed this?’” Ruff said, speaking about the family’s efforts.

Ruff’s bill has passed through the House and awaits a Senate committee vote. The Senate passed the bill twice, once in 2023 and again in 2024, back when it was Carter’s.

Attar’s bill has stalled.

Xi-Amaru has resigned himself to coming back next year. He’s determined to raise the penalty for someone who doesn’t secure their firearm. Meanwhile, he’ll ready the family for more trips to Annapolis.

“We want the legacy for NyKayla to be proper, right?“ Xi-Amaru said. “We don’t want her name just to be on anything.”

Xi-Amaru said the last few years of advocacy in Annapolis have been “beyond stressful,” and there’s ongoing challenges back in Baltimore the family continues to navigate.

The child who shot NyKayla has at times been back in the community, according to the family. Her younger siblings and cousins are still grappling with her absence.

Xi-Amaru said they look to him and the other adults in the family for answers.

“It just never gets better,” he said, “and never gets easier explaining to them why NyKayla isn’t here.”