HOPEWELL, Va. -- Community members mourned those who've died from overdose, gun violence, and 15-year-old Hopewell High School football player Jayvion Taylor at a Hopewell prayer vigil Wednesday night at the high school.
"It's been one after another. And by the time they begin to start trying to heal from one, something else happens. Opens the door right back up," Shawn Green, a Hopewell resident, said about the need for the community prayer vigil.
Taylor, a 10th grade student, died at football practice Monday night. His family said the teenager suffered a fatal heart attack while on the practice field.
The sudden death had a profound impact on friends, family, classmates, and teammates.
"He brought a lot of smiles on a lot of people's faces," said Christian Johnson, who went to Hopewell High School. "I can say he brought one of mine a few times before a game, seeing him in the hallway laughing and joking."
The vigil offered the condolences for Taylor's family, as well as other families who have lost loved ones to gun violence.
Vannette Taylor started a group called "Protect the Peace" after her son, TeDandrey, shot and killed in January 2023. She's also lost several other family members to gun violence within the last year.
She and her son, Tobias, helped organize the event, hoping to target youth who may be at risk of gun violence.
"We're trying to get the community back," Tobias Taylor said. "Get our youth all in sync with each other. Just to show them that we're here for them. We care for them, and there's better ways to go about different situations."
"Our city is like a black cloud over it, and we need it to move," Vannette Taylor said.
Since the beginning of the year, Hopewell Police have reported at least four different homicides and eight separate shootings.
Terronda Green, a pastor in Hopewell, lost her own daughter to a drug overdose in April. She now helps offer grief counseling to other families, encouraging community advocates to coordinate community prayers monthly.
"They have a safe place to go and to heal and to still be loved," Green said. "We can bring the mothers together, we can bring the fathers together, and we can bring the children together."
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