Family members, advocates and domestic violence survivors gathered for a candlelight vigil at Trinity United Methodist Church on Thursday.
LIMA — Wooden silhouettes surround the stage at Trinity United Methodist Church in a silent memorial for the dead.
Twenty-two women. Two men. Eleven children. Each murdered by a partner, parent, sibling, child or a family member’s boyfriend.
Their survivors sat in the church’s sanctuary Thursday evening as advocates read each name aloud: Dorothy Jean Jones, left to die by the railroad tracks after her boyfriend stabbed her in the heart on Aug. 11, 1990. Dead at 40.
Sonya Lynette Howton, stabbed to death by the father of her three children on May 12, 1991. Dead at 25.
Donald Ryan Huff, dead at 20 months old when his mother’s boyfriend raped and struck him in the chest.
Kea Evette Armstead, shot to death by her boyfriend. Nineteen years old.
Jasmine Fricke-Simpkins, suffocated by his step-father for crying during a Garth Brooks concert. Dead at nine months old.
The Silent Witness Memorial started in 1990 as a memorial to women killed by their partners or acquaintances in Minnesota. Anti-violence advocates created life-size wooden silhouettes, or silent witnesses, which they carried to the state capitol to bring attention to an overlooked epidemic of domestic violence.
Crossroads Crisis Center brought the tradition to Lima in 1995, so family members of Allen County residents who have died from domestic or family violence had a place to remember their loved ones.
“Domestic violence and family violence are traumatic experiences,” Christel Keller, executive director of Crossroads Crisis Center, told the crowd as they gathered in the pews for Thursday’s service.
“These experiences last weeks, years or even a lifetime. Are we meeting survivors with the resources they need? Are we expecting outcomes and results (from survivors) that we can’t accomplish in the midst of our traumatic experiences?”
With each name, advocates lit a candle beside the wooden silhouettes, illuminating the dark sanctuary.
A candle for Candi Stutzman, whose boyfriend beat and strangled her to death at the fairgrounds in 1998. Eighteen years old.
A candle for Stephanie Whitaker, whose husband beat, strangled and dumped her body in the road so he could drive over her several times. Dead at 20 years old.
A candle for Breanna Walder. April Starr Music. Carmen Chittman. Lynette McDonald. Linsi Light. Terri Lee Reniger. Michelle Murnahan. Kathleen Wangler. Mia Jorris. Christopher Faulk. Kadon Luke. Linda Jackson. Ronald Ream. Teresa Burge. Andrea Glenn. Carlin Glenn. Valeda Thomas. Teresa Nelson. Gerri Coller. Xavier Wurth. Kimberly Clark. Jaxxon Sullivan. Madilynn Shellabarger. Van Youngblood. Rachel Cheney. McKenzie Butler. Mikki Starr. Ma’Laya Dewitt.
And, finally, a candle for the victims whose deaths remain unsolved or in the courts.
Need help? Call the Crisis Line at 877-866-7273.
