Activists, officials plan a strategy

He was gunned down on a Dorchester street plagued by violence. And yesterday morning, Luis DoSouto was remembered as a free-spirited little boy who stayed out all night on that same street playing hide-and-seek.

Amid wails of grief and prayers in Portuguese, hundreds of relatives and friends gathered at St. Patrick Church in Roxbury, where the Rev. Ze Alvaro, who officiated at the funeral Mass, told the crowd to pray for an end to violence.

Just hours after the 25-year-old Cape Verdean was laid to rest, leaders and activists in the Cape Verdean community announced plans to quell gun violence sweeping many Boston neighborhoods.

''We want peace in our community," said Denise D. Gonsalves, executive director of Cape Verdean Community UNIDO, during a news conference at the Strand Theatre in Uphams Corner. Behind her stood Mayor Thomas M. Menino, Police Commissioner Kathleen M. O'Toole, and dozens of Cape Verdean leaders, teenagers, and youth workers.

''As a community, we will not tolerate the violence of a few individuals that has jeopardized the safety and growth of others," she said.

DoSouto was shot in the heart early Saturday on Hamilton Street as he tried to break up a fight during a house party, police say. William Badgett, 19, of Mattapan, has pleaded not guilty to charges of first-degree murder, and Darnell Ricks, 18, of Dorchester, pleaded not guilty to being an accessory after the fact.

Saturday night, someone fatally shot Alex Mendes, another Cape Verdean and the son of antiviolence activist Isaura Mendes. His funeral is scheduled for tomorrow at the same church where mourners for DoSouto gathered. Last night, Isaura Mendes helped lead a candlelight march, where she held up a picture of her slain son and urged people not to seek vengeance.

Gonsalves said Cape Verdean leaders want to encourage more communication between parents and children; provide more resources for young people, particularly those with criminal records; and find ways to improve the relationship between the Cape Verdean community and the Police Department, including hiring Cape Verdean homicide detectives.

''We have never stood for violence in our community," she said. ''We stand for peace."

Earlier in the day, other politicians, including Councilor at Large Sam Yoon, state Representative Marie St. Fleur, and state Senator Dianne Wilkerson, gathered with neighborhood activists to announce the city's first Peace Weekend, which includes an annual youth conference tomorrow, and the annual Mother's Walk for Peace on Sunday.

It is not certain that Isaura Mendes, whose son, Bobby, was stabbed to death in 1995, will walk in the event, said Tina Chery, a friend of Mendes and head of the Louis D. Brown Peace Institute in Dorchester. Chery founded the Mother's Walk for Peace after her son, for whom the institute is named, was killed in 1993 when he was caught in a gang crossfire.

''My call is to . . . scream on the streets that we will not allow another mother's child to kill another mother's child," Chery said.

St. Fleur called on the public not to view the recent violence as a problem that affects only specific parts of the city or a certain group of people. ''This is a Boston problem, not a Cape Verdean problem," she said.

At DoSouto's funeral, the message about fighting violence was the same. Young women wore T-shirts emblazoned with DoSouto's face. About a dozen young men, brothers and cousins of DoSouto, donned crisp white shirts and pants, similar to the uniform he wore as head chef at the Bayside Expo & Conference Center.

At the end of the Mass, the men walked slowly alongside the casket toward the exit of St. Patrick Church. As they walked, their faces somber, the soft sobs from the women in the church pews turned to loud cries.

The procession of cars to DoSouto's burial went down Hamilton Street, past the site where he was shot.

After the funeral one mourner, Daniel Pina, 33, stood outside the church, behind DoSouto's family.

''Too many times this has happened, somebody getting shot for nothing," he said. ''Why we can't have peace, I don't know."

Adrienne P. Samuels of the Globe staff contributed to this report. Cramer can be reached at mcramer@globe.com; Ballou at bballou@globe.com.