Buffalo, New York (AP) – The first funeral for 10 blacks killed at a Buffalo supermarket is scheduled for Friday, a day after the families of the nation’s victims called to face the threat of maximum violence in white.
A private service is scheduled for Friday morning for Hayward Patterson, a beloved deacon at the Temple near Tops Friendly Market in the Buffalo Black Community. The family requested that the press release of the funeral ceremony be closed.
Patterson, 67, offered an informal taxi service to help people get home from the market carrying their shopping bags. Russell Bell, pastor of Church of the Tabernacle of Christ God, said Patterson was helping someone with their shopping when he was shot and killed Saturday.
He was called the good father of Tirza Patterson, the deacon’s former wife and mother of 12-year-old son Hayward Patterson. “She takes care of him. “He got what he asked for,” he said at a press conference with civil rights chief Reverend Al Sharpton and family attorney Ben Cramp on Thursday.
Jacques “Jake” Patterson, the deacon’s son, expressed his grief at the press conference and covered his face with his hands as he spoke to his mother. When he finished, Jake held Shapton in his arms and quietly cried, wiping his shirt to wipe away his tears.
“His heart was broken,” Jake’s mother said, adding that her son was having difficulty sleeping and eating.
“As a mother, what can I do to help her get through this?” he says.
Roberta Drury, one of the youngest killed at the Buffalo market, is expected to wake up on Friday afternoon. The 32-year-old went to Tops to shop, said her mother, Dezeline McDuffie, who with whom Drur recently came home to live.
Drur’s funeral will be held Saturday at the Church of the Assumption in Syracuse, approximately 245 miles east of Buffalo. His family also demanded that the press service be closed.
Five more victims of the buffalo shooting are scheduled to be buried next week.
Source: Huffpost
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