‘I can still see her dancing’ says friend of Brockton victim

BROCKTON - A 23-year-old Cape Verdean immigrant who came to America in the hopes of going to college is clinging to life in a Boston hospital this morning, after being raped, shot and savagely beaten during an alleged hate-crime attack that claimed her sister’s life.

After being sexually assaulted, the woman was blasted in both her arms and legs and her chest. She was also bludgeoned with a hammer or a gun, relatives say.

She can barely speak, but relatives say she knows that her younger sister, Selma Goncalves, 20, who immigrated to this country with her just one year ago, won’t be coming home.

“She could say, ‘I believe my sister is dead,”’ said Antunes Barros, 32, recounting what relatives have told him about his cousin, who has a 2-year-old son. “Everybody is hoping she’ll pull through,” Barros said in an interview outside the home of the sisters’ father.

Police say Goncalves was targeted by her former neighbor, Keith Luke, who allegedly set out Wednesday to kill “non-whites,” starting with her.

Relatives said the Gonclaveses moved to the United States to be closer to their father and go to school. They worked and took Engish language classes in the hopes of going to college. They were inseparable, said Lori Pontes, 20, who grew up with Selma Goncalves in Cape Verde.

“They were like twins,” said Pontes, who lives in Boston. Pontes said she’ll cling to vibrant memories she has of her best friend, with whom she took samba classes as a child.

“I can still see her dancing,” she said.