Kansas City mothers who have lost children to homicide gather and share grief, hope

Raven Bridges lost her son Kamari Bridges on Halloween night 2021. He was shot and killed near Prospect Avenue and East 54th Street.

“A friend of mine came and started banging on the door, telling me that Kamari got shot in the chest, and he’s on his way to St. Luke’s Hospital,” Bridges said. “I panicked.”

Theresa Nunally lost her son Anthony Ford II on May 31, 2020. He was fatally shot in his father’s Kansas City home.

“It’s a feeling I don’t wish on my worst enemy,” Nunally said. “It’s difficult trying to be strong for my grandchildren and my other children.”

Pamela Dean lost her son Brandon Dean in June 2014. He was shot five times in the back.

“He got into a fistfight with his best friend,” Dean said. “I guess his friend could not take him getting the better of him, and he came back, … and gunned my son down like an animal when he came out of the store.”

These three mother recently gathered with others to support one another in their grief.

The monthly meetings are sponsored by KC Mothers in Charge and offer a variety of services.

“I started this organization out of my grief and pain,” Rosilyn Temple, the group’s founder, said. “We have to come together and stand together, speak out together and do something.”

Amid the nationwide debate on guns and swarm of fatal shootings in the area, these Kansas City mothers shared their stories, heartache and hope for a less-violent future.

‘I just wanted to trade places with him’

Brandon Dean was the best wide receiver ever and the Kansas City Chiefs’ biggest fan, his mom says.

“He was a good kid,” Pamela Dean said. “Only thing he loved was football.”

Brandon was shot in the back five times while exiting a store in June 2014. He had argued with a friend earlier that day.

“My son was running for his life,” Dean said.

He burst into the Church’s Chicken at 39th Street and Indiana Avenue. His mom was right around the corner.

“They ran around there and (shouted), ‘Brandon’s been shot!’” she said.

At first, she was in shock.

“You know how you want to move but you can’t,” she said. “I was just frozen.”

Then she ran.

She got to the restaurant before first responders and saw her 21-year-old son splayed out on the floor.

Beating on the doors, windows, anything to get inside and be with her son, she pleaded, “Let me in, I’m his mother!”

When she finally got inside, Brandon was still alive.

“I tried to plug the holes with my fingers,” she said, tears filling her eyes.

“He looked at me and said, ‘It hurts,’” she said. “I just wanted to trade places with him.”

Later, Temple reached out to her.

And Temple got the mayor, media, police department and community involved to apprehend the killer, Dean said.

“If it had not been for Rosilyn and KC Mothers in Charge, I would not have found my son’s murderer,” Dean said. “We knew who he was, but he was on the run.”

In 2016, Dean joined the organization as a Core Mother — mothers who help lead outreach efforts and actively participate in speaking engagements and attend community events.

“I just want to give back to the community and be there for the next family that has been victimized because I know how it is,” Dean said. “It never ends, never. That hurt, that pain.”

To this day, Dean is always clad from head to toe in Chiefs gear in honor of her son.

“That’s why you see me always in Chiefs attire,” she said. “My car, … my home, … I’m Chiefs kingdom forever. My son, I know there are other fans out there, but my son was the biggest fan ever.”

Dean feels that teaching conflict resolution skills would help reduce gun related homicides.

“Talk out your problems, if you can,” Dean said. “Don’t just pick up a gun and that’s the first thing you do is go and take someone’s life.”

Searching for justice

Temple stresses the importance of working with law enforcement to solve homicide cases and inviting them to meetings.

“Every other month, we might bring out detectives to talk about certain cases,” Temple said.

The organization was awarded a grant in 2019 through the Missouri Department of Justice, Temple said.

“We try knocking on doors and speaking to the neighbors, trying to do home visits — coming into the house asking them how can we help them to make their neighborhoods safe,” Temple said. “The police can do so much, but as a community, when we know something, we see something, we hear something, we have to speak out and stand up and do something to make a difference.”

‘I was just numb’

Rebecca Scott had surgery on her knee on June 10, 2016.

The next day, while she was recovering at her home, she got the message.

Her 25-year-old son, Rodney Peoples, had been shot across from Central High School.

“I broke out running,” Scott said. “Don’t remember how I got to the scene, but I was there.”

It took two years for his death to really set in for her, Scott said.

“He wasn’t going to run up the street and tell me, ‘Mom, I was just playing.’”

Peoples had three children — 4-month-old twins and a 2-year-old.

“That’s going to be a memory for their life,” Scott said. “They know every time they’ve turned a year old, in four months their dad will be gone the same amount of years they are in age.”

Temple knew Scott and her family and reached out after the homicide.

“It took a minute, but I said, ‘Lord, I got to get out of here,’ because sitting here is not going to help me,” Scott said. “What better thing to do for me was to be there for another mother that was getting ready to go through, or going through, what I had been through.” Scott started going to KC Mothers in Charge events and support groups.

“Being there just made me OK,” she said. “It made me realize I’m not the only one hurting.”

Stricter enforcement of gun laws would help reduce the violence, Scott feels.

She also has a message for parents: “If you know your child’s in something, stop it,” she said. “I’d rather see them in jail than in the ground.”

Scott would like to talk with young people, “especially the men, and tell them how important it is for them to live, instead of dying,” she said. “Find something else that occupies you besides violence, guns — go to school, get a good job, if you’re a father be the best father you can be.”

Eight years later, her son’s murder is still unsolved.

What Scott wants most is closure.

“Not just for me, for all my mothers that lost a child,” Scott said. “If we can get some closure on some homicides, it would help so much.”

A safe space to grieve

Once a month, KC Mothers in Charge has a hope and healing support group for those who have been victimized by homicide.

“We grieve, we talk about our pain and where we’re at,” Temple said.

The organization also contracts with licensed counselors to speak with members.

“People can talk to someone about their trauma, their grief and suffering because you lose someone or you get shot, all the trauma that you’re dealing with is going to surface somewhere,” Temple said. “We share the same pain.”

‘My soul was snatched out of my body’

Anthony Ford II called his mother, Theresa Nunally, on May 31, 2020, to let her know he was dropping off his son and going to his father’s to get his things.

“Something just didn’t sit right when I got off the phone with my son,” Nunally said. “I started praying really hard, and a few minutes later it just felt like my soul was snatched out of my body.”

The first call Nunally received was from her daughter, asking what was wrong with her brother.

The next call was letting her know her 27-year-old son had been shot.

“I ran over there, everything was taped off,” she said. “I didn’t know anything, nobody would tell me anything, so I’m just sitting there, knowing that my child is in there.”

He had been shot and killed by his first cousin in his father’s house, Nunally said.

Temple was already at the scene.

“She greeted me and let me know who she was and why she was there,” Nunally said. “I was just thankful for that because my son’s family was not very kind to me.”

Having KC Mothers in Charge is important “to be here to get the support I need, so I can continue to help others,” Nunally said. “I’m like the elder of my family, and so everybody has always looked up to me as I’m the strong one and not understanding that this is something totally different, that I need some support.”

Being able to connect with other mothers has helped, Nunally said.

“It does help with the healing and just (to) be able to go on from day to day,” she said. “When we share our stories, it lets others know that it’s OK to be angry or hurt or confused.”

A lot of gun violence starts with mental health issues, Nunally feels.

“Young men, when they’re little we’re teaching them don’t cry, you’re not a girl, and so they’re suppressing their feelings,” she said. “You can be depressed and falling apart, but you better not tell anybody outside — a lot of people were raised that way.”

More funding for mental health services and more programs for children would help reduce gun violence, Nunally said.

“That’s where it’s starting at, when they’re children,” she said. “Help build the children up and give them more things to do that are positive.”

Engaging the community

In addition to providing support, KC Mothers in Charge goes out into the community to prevent violence.

“We do a lot of speakings and engagement in our community, in the schools and wherever we’re needed,” Temple said. “We step out and do, to make it safer, to save a life in our community.”

They also provide resources for people to anonymously make crime tips.

‘It’s not getting easy, but it’s getting better’

Raven Bridges had a conversation with her 15-year-old son, Kamari Bridges, right before she got off work on Halloween 2021.

Kamari was telling her about getting ready for school the next day. Later, around 7:45 p.m., they talked again on the phone.

“He said he was in a car and he was on his way home, so I started cooking,” Bridges said.

Not long after, “a friend of mine came and started banging on the door, telling me that Kamari got shot in the chest, and he’s on his way to St. Luke’s Hospital,” Bridges said. She panicked.

“(I) ran out the door, don’t think I shut the door, went to the hospital and sat there,” Bridges said. “About a good 20 minutes, 30 minutes later, they came and told me that he passed away.”

Bridges started going to KC Mothers in Charge events a few months after Temple initially contacted her.

“She set me up to do counseling, so I go to counseling with them on Tuesdays and come to the group meetings on Thursdays,” Bridges said. “It’s not getting easy, but it’s getting better.”

Aug. 9, Kamari’s birthday, was going to be especially hard, Bridges said.

“He’ll be 16,” she said.

Bridges recommends other grieving mothers try to keep busy with things like journaling.

“I have people around me, I go to work and we try and do fun stuff, go places,” she said. “It helps, a little bit.”

Bridges still talks to her son, which she finds therapeutic.

“I know he’s not going to reply back to me, but I talk to him every night,” she said. “I do it through writing or just talking. I’ll be riding down the street and I just talk, just let him know that I’m still here.”

At the scene

Kansas City has some of the highest homicide rates in the nation. So far this year, as of Aug. 8, there have been 100 homicides in the city and 153 total in the metro area.

The metro area number peaked with 269 homicides in 2020, followed by 244 homicides the next year.

Homicide was the second leading cause of death for those ages 15-24 in 2020 but was the leading cause of death for Black youth ages 15-24, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Males were five times more likely to die by gun homicide than females, according to a 2020 study by the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

Temple’s presence at a crime scene usually means one thing: death.

“When a mother sees me, they know it’s death,” Temple said. “They scream, they hug me, we just connect.”

When Temple lost her son in 2011, she felt alone.

“There wasn’t anyone out there to walk me, support me,” she said. “I knew right then and there that I had to do something in my community, make a difference for someone else that was going to endure the pain.”

“My life had changed forever.”

To contact KC Mothers in charge, call 816-912-2601 or visit kcmothersincharge.org.