The murder of our daughter, Jennifer Ross, has changed our family forever.  Born to us on June 21, 1986, she brought immeasureable joy to us throughout her life. We are a close-knit family, living lives of faith and hope; now our fervent prayer is that the act which took her life will not take the life out of us.  We strive each day not to ask the pointless question of "why", but rather to focus on what good can come out of this senseless act of violence.

Shortly before 3:00 a.m. on the morning of December 24, 2006, my husband and I were awakened by the ringing telephone. A police officer was phoning to tell us that Jennifer had been shot and would be transported to Memorial Medical Center once she had been stabilized by the ambulance crew. Seven hours later, after heroic work by the surgery team, we saw our daughter for the first time since midnight the night before. At that time, we'd been celebrating a rite of passage in all our lives, her presentation as a debutante, which is akin to bat mitzvahs and other coming-of-age celebrations. Now, we celebrated the fact that Jennifer was alive, after being shot in the back during a botched robbery effort. Our gratitude for her life overshadowed all other feelings as we rode a rollercoaster of events in the successive week, with two more surgeries and a nasty infection or two thrown in for good measure. 

Jennifer's physical strength and her will to live were triumphant time and time again. We reveled in each milestone as she achieved it, and the pinnacle of hope came on Sunday morning, January 1, when we were told that she would be fine and could begin to eat and move around. I went to church, and Rusty stayed with Jenn. 

Then, the tide turned against us. The bullet had exploded Jenn's appendix, done damage to her muscle tissues, spinal column, and several major blood vessels. One of these developed an aneurysm, undetectable while it was compressed by her swollen tissues. As she began to move about in preparation for physical therapy, it burst. 

The last time that I saw Jennifer, she lay outstretched on a hospital bed, with machines doing the work normally done by her athletic heart and lungs.  Blood was everywhere — spattered across her face and chest; garishly oversized caricatures of the tiny brown freckles that dusted her cheekbones and turned-up nose. 

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Her hand was warm, thanks to the countless pints of blood which had been pouring into her for the previous six hours, in an effort to replace that which was lost when the bullet-nicked artery in her abdomen formed an aneurysm and blew apart. But although it was warm, her hand was lifeless in mine. I held it in a vain attempt to call her back to us, while my husband, Rusty; my son, Joseph; and his fiancée, Sarah, prayed without ceasing for her to be healed and return to us. That was not to be, and a little over an hour later, Jennifer died.

And our family will never be the same. We won't see Jennifer graduate from college, surrounded by her sorority sisters and whooping to beat the band. Rusty will not walk Jennifer down the aisle at her wedding; no young man will ask his permission to marry her, as another young man has already taken her away for good. Joseph will be an only child, with no sister to turn to for comfort, for advice, for solace when, in due course, we are gone. I will not caress her pregnant tummy, feeling the new life within her as it kicks and twists and, unlike her, lives. Jenn came from a long line of strong-minded women that continuum is broken.

Her death was the final straw for a lot of people not only in Savannah and Chatham County, but around the country. It shouldn't have happened. She was not engaging in risky behavior; she was walking on the morning of Christmas Eve with three friends, across a Savannah square which they had crossed countless times during their lives. Men she had never met before demanded that she give them her purse... And she said, "NO." She had worked for the money inside that purse. It was hers, and she wasn't about to give it to somebody else just because they were demanding it.

It wasn't just the death of an innocent girl which galvanized so many people; it was the death of their own indifference. A series of murders wherein the victims were truly blameless had shocked our community into action some months earlier, resulting in study groups and task forces.  What if our city, our county, our state had decided just to do as she did — to just say, "NO, you can't have what I have just because you want it." 

Jennifer's murder galvanized and energized everyone who heard of it, because it showcased the difference between two mentalities: one which still believes that you must work for what you want, and one which believes that you can take what someone else has worked for. And while I cry for our loss, I cannot help but see the good which is coming out of her death.

Thousands of people have written to tell us of their turn, or return, to faith. The quality of their lives is better because they don't take anything for granted any more. They try harder to appreciate each moment with their loved ones, knowing that there is no guarantee of tomorrow. Countless others have written to tell us of their renewed commitment to the safety and quality of life in their neighborhoods, cities, and counties. People are running for office, signing up to become law enforcement officers, organizing neighborhood watches; or just keeping an eye out for one another. We gain a measure of peace and comfort knowing that Jenn's death was not entirely in vain.

But we are broken; individually and collectively. Our hearts are in pieces and sleep is often elusive. Food tastes like chalk, and is consumed only to prevent any further decline in health. We have lived this year in a manner that is entirely foreign to us; leaving town for every major occasion, from Mother's Day to Father's Day to birthdays and anniversaries.  We will not be home for Thanksgiving or for Christmas this year. The pain is just too great, and we need to be with our extended families to draw upon them for strength and renewal.

 Our faith in God is the only thing which has not been weakened by Jennifer's death.  We hold onto it for dear life. Like many of those who have written to us, we seek solace in appreciating each moment of each day. We give thanks each day for making it through the previous night; and we give thanks each night for having made it through that day. We will never be the same again — but someday, we will be healed.