Tristyn Bailey's parents carrying on her legacy by spreading kindness
Tristyn Bailey, 13, was murdered on Mother's Day 2021. Now that her killer has been sentenced to life in prison, her parents are focused on carrying on her legacy.
It's been almost 23 months since Tristyn Bailey's life was taken, leaving a gaping hole in the lives of all those who loved her.
“The best word is unbearable,” Stacy Bailey, Tristyn’s mother said. “You can’t really go through the grieving process when you are in court every month, every other month. It’s like you are in fight or flight mode.”
Her 13-year-old daughter, the youngest of Stacy and Forrest Bailey’s five children, was murdered on Mother’s Day 2021.
“Everything you hear about her is true. She had so many friends,” Stacy Bailey said. “She did so many things trying to help friends, to be there for people who maybe didn't have friends.”
“She was our baby, Stacy’s best friend. She was a phenomenal daughter, an amazing sibling, a friend that people would want to have, a teammate that is that supportive teammate that does their job and helps pick everybody up,” Forrest Bailey said.
Tristyn’s parents have left her bedroom exactly as she left it.
“Our cat knows how to open the door and almost gives us a sense that she goes in there just to be near her. But it's really hard to walk in there. It's hard to go in the upstairs of our house because you know she should be there,” Stacy Bailey said. “Yesterday, I found a tube of toothpaste that she had written her name on. I can't bear to throw it away. I just hold on to it. It’s that last little piece that you have of your child.”
May 9, 2021 'We all had that sinking feeling'
Tristyn and her sister had been planning on making breakfast for their mom to celebrate Mother’s Day. But that morning when Tristyn didn’t come downstairs her family realized she was missing. They would later learn she had snuck out the night before to meet a friend and Aiden Fucci.
“I think I knew within the hour of that 911 call who she was last with, and pretty devastated because I had never heard Aiden's name before,” Stacey Bailey said. “It felt like I had been punched in the gut. And I knew something bad had happened at that point. And I think you sit there and pray and pray that she's going to be fine. But I knew that this wasn’t a behavior of hers. I knew she wouldn’t not come home. She was so family oriented. There was no way she would have stayed out all night. We all had that sinking feeling.”
Her body would be found hours later in the woods in their St. Johns County neighborhood. Her classmate, Aiden Fucci, was arrested and charged with first-degree murder.
“I think when you learn that it's somebody that she went to school with, like, I still can't process that. You don't think that the kid next to you in class is capable of doing something like that,” Stacy Bailey said. “I don't know that I'll ever be able to understand it.”
While Tristyn and Fucci went to the same school, the Baileys said Fucci didn’t have their daughter’s phone number and wasn’t connected to her on social media until the night he killed her.
“He is a particularly vicious anomaly of an individual. And there's so much that Stacy and I want other parents and other kids to know and to learn from this. One thing we've said many times is the impact of social media and people being very, very careful about who's reaching out to them and who's talking to them. Because you don't always know who's on the other end. And a friend of a friend is not somebody that you want to spend time with.”
A guilty plea 'Relief is a good word'
In February, the day jury selection was scheduled to begin, Fucci, pleaded guilty to murdering Tristyn.
“Relief is a good word,” Forrest Bailey said. “As a victim’s family it is unbelievably hard to sit in a room with somebody who is responsible for killing one of your family members.”
Before a judge sentenced Fucci to life in prison, Tristyn’s sister during victim impact statements dropped aqua stone hearts into a jar to mark each time Tristyn was stabbed.
“The 114 stones just really showed how brutal this crime was, and everything that Tristyn had to endure. And the horrific nature of it, which we were concerned could have been lost. Because as her family those are the things that haunt you late at night is, what she went through and what she had to endure and the pain that she had when she was fighting back and fighting for her life.”
Carrying on her legacy 'The good amongst our fellow neighbor is far greater than the evil we see in the world'
It's a crime that has impacted so many people in St. Johns County and far beyond. And the Baileys want kids to know how important it is to share how they're feeling with their family and for parents to really listen.
“Listen to your kids’ feelings, because when they finally open up to you, they'll have a lot to say to you,” Stacy Bailey said.
The Baileys are grateful for the outpouring of support they’ve received. The aqua ribbons spread across the community are signs to them of the good in the world.
“It's breathtaking. I think that it's given us a little bit of our safety back because we knew that we had people there that were embracing us and giving us the support that we needed,” Stacy Bailey said.
And they credit their faith with sustaining them.
“Simply put, I don't think that we would be where we are without our faith and wouldn’t have gotten as far as we have in the manner that we have without it,” Forrest Bailey said. “I don't think I've ever had more questions of faith than what I've gone through in the past 23 months. And I've also leaned on my faith the most that I ever have in my life.”
“There are times where you question the why, how, but at the end of the day, you just have to rely on your faith,” Stacy Bailey said. “I just have to remind myself that people have free choice that it wasn't God's doing. Someone else did this.”
While Fucci’s sentence will be up for review in 25 years because of he was 14 when he killed Tristyn, the Baileys say their focus is on carrying on their daughter’s legacy by spreading kindness.
“I think for society, justice was done,” Forrest Bailey said. “For us, it doesn't bring justice and it doesn't bring closure. What it does bring is a milestone for us to focus our efforts on not what is the legal proceedings, but how do we move forward and do good to this world?”
They plan to do that in a number of ways through the Tristyn Bailey Memorial Foundation including offering self-defense classes at a local gym and giving out Tristyn Bailey Awards to local athletes.
“The thing that I walk away with and I would hope people do is look at the good that we've seen amongst our community, and realize that the good amongst our fellow neighbor is far greater than the evil we see in the world,” Forrest Bailey said. “And that is what we need to continue to do for each other. And the most important place that that starts is within each of our individual homes and those times together to treasure every moment.”
