The We Project hosts vigil to honor victims of Buffalo shooting

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

Communities across the nation including right here in Mid-Missouri, are hosting vigils and prayer services to honor victims of the buffalo shooting. 

People used the vigil tonight not only to grieve those lost but to also call for stronger gun laws. 

People across Mid-Missouri came to the Boone County Courthouse to pay tribute to the victims of the supermarket shooting Monday night but to also call for change against gun violence so this doesn't happen again. 

Daimontre Yancy says, "I believe it's our duty to fight for our freedom." 

There were emotions of anger-sadness and shock felt at the courthouse columns. 

People gathered to honor and mourn the victims of the racially motivated shooting that left 10 people dead and three wounded at a Buffalo, New York grocery store. 

The youngest victim was 32-year-old Roberta Drury, who went to the store to buy food to make dinner. 

The oldest was 86-year-old Ruth Whitfield, who had been taking care of her husband who was in a nursing home. 

The vigil was held by The We Project, is committed on working to end racial terror in communities. 

Yancy attended the vigil and he says this is something that needs to be talked about. 

Yancy says, "the educational system, the way we see science, the way we deliver ourselves in society, I don't think there is a quick fix to white supremacy in itself or any sort of anti-blackness."

Yancy tells me he isn't sure how to feel about the shooting and to see elderly people killed is heartbreaking. 

"To see like people in my grandparent's age lose their ya know its scary its scary," says Yancy. 

The Department of Justice says there were over 8,000 hate crime incidents reported in the US in 2020.

61-percent of the incidents were reported as racially motivated. 

In 2020, there were 117 hate crimes reported against a person with 78 of those being racially motivated in Missouri.