JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — An event for healing and remembrance of those impacted by violence took over A. Philip Randolph Heritage Park in Jacksonville’s Eastside Saturday morning.
The message 'Living Beyond the Bullets' was displayed on shirts for the event, but the message is also one that Feletta Smith lives by every day.
“Me being shot 13 times, I’m living my life now beyond the bullets. Beyond what happened to me, next chapter, let’s move on," Feletta Smith, a organizer with Crime Survivors for Safety and Justice, said.
It was 2004 when Smith says she was shot during a double homicide that left a man and a teenager dead. It was a day that forever changed Smith’s life and the moment she met officer Shawn Coarsey, who is now JSO’s undersheriff.
“He’s been here since 2004 when it actually happened and through that we have built like a friendship," Smith said.
Building relationships with JSO and living beyond crime are the messages this group is sharing during this day of healing event.
“The community are the eyes and the ears of Jacksonville they’re the ones that see and hear everything and have all the knowledge of what’s going on in their neighborhood without them we can’t do our jobs," Shawn Coarsey, the Undersheriff for the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office, said.
Organizers with Crime Survivors for Safety and Justice are hoping to make the event an annual time for the community to come together and heal.
“It doesn’t mean you got shot, a victim could be anybody, and that’s just what we want to show them that, you don’t have to be alone being a victim because there are all kinds of victims in the world," Inez Brown, an organizer, said,
“Although we’ve lost our loved ones, we’re still here for them, we’re going to keep their name alive," Smith said.