SHREVEPORT, La. — Seven hearses pulled up to the church under gray skies Saturday morning, and workers unloaded the eight caskets, two of them so small they could ride together.
It was a moment the battered city in northwest Louisiana had been girding itself for ever since the frantic morning last month when the despondent father of seven of the children methodically shot them in their bedrooms. The killings of so many children — the youngest just 3 and the oldest 11 — shocked the country and brought attention to the plight of the three mothers badly injured in the attack who survived only to face the agony of losing nearly every one of their children.
In the days after the attack on April 19, the mothers decided to hold one funeral for all of their children. They chose the Saturday of Mother’s Day weekend and posted fliers with the faces of the children they now call “the Eternal Eight.”
Hundreds of people lined up hours early to pay their respects, filing into the sanctuary of Summer Grove Baptist Church, past the open caskets and framed images of the children waving, curtsying and riding motorbikes.
Grandmothers came on walkers, mothers with babies in their arms and clutching children’s hands. Many, including grown men, wiped away tears as they sat in the pews of the spacious sanctuary. There were so many people that officials provided three city buses to take the mourners to the cemetery after the service.
The three mothers of the victims sat in the front row with female relatives wearing white, and facing the open caskets. Christina Snow, 31, had images of her three children — Braylon, 5; Khedarrion, 6, and Sariahh, 11 — emblazoned on the back of her jacket under the banner “In loving memory.” She stopped to touch their faces, then bent and kissed them. Older women from the family followed, one weeping, another almost collapsing until she was led away.
Shaneiqua Pugh, 34, who lost all four of her children — Jayla, 3; Shayla, 5; Kayla, 6; and Layla, 7 — was shot nine times and later underwent surgery at the hospital. The first time she and the other two mothers were able to see their children’s bodies was at a viewing at the funeral home Friday.
Keosha Pugh, Shaneiqua’s younger sister and the mother of Mar’Kaydon Pugh, 10, avoided being shot in the attack by jumping off the roof. She broke her hip and pelvis in the fall. Like her sister and Snow, she did not speak at the funeral.
Funeral home staff placed golden crowns on the children’s heads before closing the caskets.
Rep. Cleo Fields (D-Louisiana), who represents the area, entered the church with former Rep. Gabby Giffords of Arizona, who survived a mass shooting outside Tucson, in 2011 that killed six and wounded 18. After she recovered from her head wound, Giffords became a gun violence prevention advocate alongside her husband, Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Arizona).
“We’re a team,” Giffords said of her and Fields as they entered and found seats near the front with other officials, including the police chief and the schools superintendent.
Fields said that although he and local lawmakers were preparing to speak about the tragedy, “Words can’t express.”
The children were so young, they still attended Head Start day care, state Sen. Sam Jenkins (D) reminded the crowd. They had nicknames like K Bug, Noonie and Jaybae, loved playing with their dolls’ hair, making TikTok videos, sharing what they’d learned at school with their grandmother, standing up for siblings and taking out the trash, according to the funeral program.
Shreveport Mayor Tom Arceneaux (R) read a proclamation that called the children’s presence “a gift.” “Their absence is deeply felt,” he said. “Neighbors carry a shared sorrow that stretches across streets and neighborhoods. Their lives, though brief, were deeply meaningful.”
Arceneaux and his wife then stepped down from the altar to present copies of the proclamation to the three mothers.
Fields reminded the crowd that, “This is not a Shreveport mourning. This is a national mourning.”
He said Giffords phoned him immediately after the shooting and again Friday to say she was coming to the funeral. “All of us should be outraged that we live in a country that routinely subjects our kids to such unimaginable violence,” Giffords had said in a statement after the shooting. Fields asked Giffords to stand, to applause and cheers. “She just wanted to come and let the family know that this pain is not just in Louisiana — it’s all across the country,” Fields said.
In the front row before him, the mothers nodded.
Shamar Elkins, 31, shot the children and two of their mothers last month in an attack that rocked this small city and a country grappling with deadly domestic violence. His wife, Shaneiqua Pugh, had filed for divorce, and the couple was scheduled to appear in court the next day.
Within an hour of the attack, which authorities described as “execution style,” Elkins, a Louisiana Army National Guard veteran who had been working for UPS, died in a shootout with police. Troy Brown, the husband of Keosha Pugh, said Elkins had struggled with mental problems, was evaluated and prescribed medication at a local Veterans Affairs hospital earlier this year.
It was the deadliest mass shooting this year in America, where women are more likely to be killed in their homes than anywhere else, usually by a man with a gun, and domestic violence is a leading cause of death for children, research shows.
“What is accountability going to look like in a situation like this?” U.S. Attorney Zachary A. Keller said at a Friday briefing, where he announced two grand jury indictments against men who had been involved.
Charles Ford of Shreveport was indicted in connection with supplying Elkins with the assault-style rifle used in the shooting, Keller said. Ford, 56, was charged with being a felon in possession of a firearm and making a false statement to federal agents investigating the shooting. He faces up to 20 years in prison.
Michael Mayence, 54, of Bossier City, Louisiana, was also indicted by the grand jury, Keller said. A fellow veteran and friend whom Elkins had gone to meet when he died, Mayence was charged with possessing a firearm while subject to a domestic violence injunction. Investigators recovered four guns from his home after the shooting. He faces up to 15 years in prison.
“We’re trying to do things to prevent these incidents from happening,” Keller said.
Inside the church on Saturday, Bishop Joseph Hall of First Baptist Church of Cedar Grove told the crowd there are no “easy answers.”
“How do you respond to something you are not prepared for?” he said. “Some pain is so deep, you cannot carry it by yourself.”
When Hall asked those in need of prayer to stand, more than a dozen did, including Christina Snow. The Rev. Melvin Porter exhorted the crowd to “understand the importance of comforting each other … Even in the face of violence and devastation, love is still stronger than anything.”
The three mothers processed out together. Keosha Pugh wiped away tears as she rode in a wheelchair pushed by her husband. Funeral home staff loaded the tiny white caskets back into the hearses as mourners shouted “take care of our babies.”
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