CITY STREETS / LOUISVILLE, KENTUCKY
Three Homicides in Louisville, Kentucky
A closer look at three lives lost to homicides in Louisville, Kentucky
As of September 8th, 2020, the city of Louisville, Kentucky, has logged 108 homicides. With 118 killings, 2016 currently holds the record for the most violent year. Authorities in Louisville expect 2020 to break that record. Sixty-five cases from 2020 remain “open” or unsolved. The local-news cycle over these senseless deaths seems only to numb the city to this horrific and ongoing spiral of violence.
This article looks behind the headlines to bear witness to the human cost of three homicides.
Aaron Williams
December 6th, 1989 — January 20th, 2016
Wednesday, January 20th, 2016, was a cold and violent night in Louisville, Kentucky. An approaching snowstorm had brought two inches of snow, and the temperature was a chilly 23 degrees. Three people were murdered that night, hours apart, in unrelated incidents.
26-year old Aaron C. Williams was one of the victims that night. He was found dead in his car on Old Manslick Road, with multiple gunshot wounds.
Williams was a high-school basketball star who had broken numerous records. According to his family, Williams lived for his 2-year old daughter Aaryn Elise Williams.
There were 123 homicides in the Louisville area in 2016, breaking the previous record of 110, set 45 years earlier in 1971. The 2016 total was a 43 percent increase from 2015 and was over double the number of homicides in 2014.
The murder of Aaron Williams remains one of the 47 unsolved homicides from 2016.
Juanita Williams: Aaron Williams’ mother
“The day it happened my life changed forever. My life stopped. I was robbed. They robbed me of Aaron. I won’t get to see my son get married. I won’t get to see my son raise his daughter. My son can’t enjoy time with me when I get older.
When they took my son my whole life stopped.
His daughter Aaryn was robbed of her father. Whenever it rains my grandbaby thinks that it’s her dad crying because he misses her. She has bad days whenever it rains.
I visit my son three to four times a week because I make sure he won’t be at that graveyard by himself. I go there and make sure the grave is clean and not messy. I bring him fresh flowers. It’s my second home. It’s the only place where I find peace. I always go there every holiday. He loved all the holidays and was always with me. That’s my way of bonding with my son. I celebrate his life and I will continue to do that until the day that I can’t do it anymore.
The killers don’t realize how many lives they have destroyed. When they take one, they take everyone down that was associated with him. His brother, Tony, who was also a star basketball player, stopped playing when Aaron died. He never played again.
When Aaron died I was angry with God. I had to question God, because I felt I did everything that I was supposed to have done. So why did you have to take my child? I still tussle with that. I have met family members that say they forgave their children’s killers. I just don’t think that I could ever get there. So if God was judging me on that, then I guess I’m going go to hell and I wouldn’t go to heaven.
People say things like God’s got him. He’s in a better place. He’s with God. It was God’s will, and so on. I don’t believe in any of that. It’s harsh but true. God had no hand in that. People forget about the devil.”
Eric Price: Aaron’s father
“I played basketball through high school. I started here at the Parkland Boys and Girls Club. I was a standout player. Ended up playing in high school. I had a few division titles and two basketball scholarship offers.
I turned away the scholarship offers when Aaron was born. I decided to stay back and raise my son. I was working at the supermarket, bagging groceries when he was born.
Aaron was always fascinated with the basketball. Even before he was walking he was playing with the ball. Once he was able to walk, he started dribbling the basketball.
I taught him how to play basketball here at the Parkland Boys and Girls Club. I taught him the rules first. I figured that if he understood the rules of basketball then he would be better.
In high-school basketball Aaron stood out. In his senior he broke seven different records and was the MVP.
Now when I watch basketball and I see a player do something that I think Aaron would have done or used to do, that makes me think of him a lot. Chris Powell was one of Aaron’s favorite players. So for instance when Chris Powell does a move that I know Aaron would have liked, that reminds me of Aaron. When I see Steph Curry shoot six or seven three-pointers in a row. That makes me think of Aaron. That was something that Aaron thrived on himself.
It was snowing real hard the day Aaron died. It snowed so bad I don’t think we even came out in the next couple of days. The weather was so bad.
The way my life has changed is sort of bittersweet, because I have this feeling that, what’s the worst can happen to me? And then I also have a feeling of, well I want to live my best life.
These are the best days. I’m lucky to be alive. Aaron’s not here. I don’t really complain about anything because my thinking is, here’s a here’s a young man that only lived so little of his life, so what have I to complain about?”
Jamie Allen: Aaron Williams’ girlfriend and mother of their daughter, Aaryn Price Williams
“Aaron and I started coming to the Big Four Walking Bridge when I got pregnant with Baby Aaryn. We always talked about where we would live, how we would live, and how we would raise our daughter. I wanted Aaryn
to be a cheerleader and a dancer, like me, and Aaron wanted her to be a
basketball player, like him. It was a wonderful journey.
Aaron was in love with his daughter the very moment she was born. He loved being a dad. Loved it. Just loved it.
Aaron and Aaryn loved being together. They played games. They always watched TV together and they always ate fruit together. That was their nightly ritual, to eat fruit together.
It was snowing the night he died. It was freezing cold. My shoes were soaking wet from walking through the snow and standing outside at the crime scene. That night was surreal to me. I felt numb.
For the next few months, I remember the pain being physical. My chest would hurt really bad. It felt like something was literally clenching my heart. It was the worst physical and emotional pain that I had ever felt in my life.
It was the day after Aaron’s death when little Aaryn started crying for her dad. She was saying I want my daddy, I want my daddy. I literally did not know what to say.
I had to try to explain to a little two-year-old mind that daddy lives with Jesus now. He’s in heaven. He’s in the sky and we won’t be able to see him anymore. But we can still talk to him and he’ll always watch over us and keep us safe.
Now, sometimes we will be in the car and if it is raining and she will ask, mama, does that mean my daddy’s sad? And I will say, he may be a little sad. And she will say, I’m sad too. And I will ask, why are you sad? And she will say, I know he’s crying because he misses me and I miss him too.”
Mollie Michaela White
March 30th, 1994 — January 11th, 2018
In her photographs, Mollie “Michaela” White appears smaller than everyone around her. According to her mother, 23-year old White was petite at 4’10” and weighed 94 lbs.
The shooting happened in a house near Ballardsville Road and Worthington Place Drive in East Louisville. White died at a male friend’s home, where the killer arrived to settle a score with him. White’s male friend was injured but managed to escape. White tried to hide, but the suspect hunted for her and shot her dead. At the time of his arrest, the 19-year old suspect was on a 5-year probation for a 2016 robbery conviction. He stole $100 from the house.
White’s family and friends made a GoFundMe page to raise $5,000. The money went towards a commemorative bench placed in Beckley Creek Park in White’s honor.
Just a few months after her murder, her father, Michael White, committed suicide.
Jane White: Molly “Michaela” White’s mother.
“My daughter was in the wrong place at the wrong time. We used to call her moonchild. She loved the moon. She loved animals. She rescued cats and brought home three of them. I was never a pet person but my daughter turned me into one. Mollie was cremated. There is a bench that was made for her as a memorial at Beckley Station Park.
I live it everyday. You go through it everyday.
The murder suspect is behind bars. Bail is set at $1 million, cash. He is 19 and shows not the slightest remorse. In fact, he seems to be doing great. At first I kept going to all the hearings, but then I stopped. I suggest to other survivors not to go to court too often, unless absolutely necessary. You go in hopes of seeing the murder affect the murderer. But it never does. He seems happy and jovial with his life, waving and smiling at his family and friends in court. It’s heartbreaking.
Mollie’s father Mike had lots of mental health issues, which intensified after Molly’s death. He committed suicide just a few months after her death. Her father never got over the guilt. He felt that he should have protected her. That was unreasonable. You can’t protect them. That’s not how it works. You can’t keep them inside the house all their lives. I found Mike’s body in his garage after he killed himself. I had gone there with a friend to check on him. He sent texts saying he was leaving everything on the kitchen counter. He also sent the code for the garage.
My faith in Jesus has helped me. I don’t know how people without faith in something get through something like this. It does not matter if you are a Christian or Muslim or whatever, you still need that faith to get through.”
Brennan G. Davis
September 19th, 1985- December 11th, 2015
There were 84 homicides in Louisville in 2015, up 47 percent from the year before.
That year, over 75% of the fatalities were west of interstate 65. Nearly 70% of the victims were African American. More than 50% of the shootings in 2015 occurred in only seven communities: California, Chickasaw, Park Hill, Parkland, Portland, Russell, and Shawnee — all predominantly African American neighborhoods in the west end. Homicides occurred in 21 of Louisville’s 26 residential ZIP codes. However, 14 of the 84 people died in a single one, 40212, in the city’s northwest section.
Twice in 2015, three people were killed on a single day, and on average, there was one homicide every four days in Louisville that year — the city’s deadliest in 36 years.
Over 40 cases of homicide remain open from 2015. The murder of Brennan Davis is one of them.
Davis was killed over a weekend, which saw three separate homicides.
The shooting was reported on the night of Friday, December 11th, at South Fourth Street and Park Avenue, shortly after 10 p.m. When LMPD officers arrived, they found Davis, 30, on the sidewalk. Paramedics took Davis to the University of Louisville Hospital, where he was pronounced dead of multiple gunshot wounds at 10:50 p.m.
Davis was an army reservist who had served in Afghanistan and was working towards his masters at Sullivan University. He left behind a 6-year old son. Sullivan University has created a scholarship in his name, given to people who have overcome hardships to attend graduate school.
Lonnie Rashid: Brennan Davis’ mother.
“I remember the last message I received from Brennan the night before he was killed. He told me he loved me. He had just turned 30. Some people want details of how their loved ones died. Some don’t. I’m one that does not. I don’t want to be angry. I don’t care about who, what, when.
My son once told me he thought he had the best childhood. There’s no bigger compliment a parent can hear from his or her own child. That their efforts to do the right thing for their children were not in vain.
Whenever I go to his grave, I go alone. I want to be alone with my son. I still have all of his things. What am I going to do? I can’t throw them away. It’s as if I am saying, I have all your things, I am waiting for you to come back. My son’s favorite verse from the Bible was from Philippians 4:13- I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. I have a part of it written on his grave marker.
Next to God’s love is a mother’s love. There will never be any other kind of love that will come in between. I don’t share my loss with a lot of people. I don’t want to be known as the grieving mother. I don’t want the label. I don’t want the attention.
Death is not easy. Death is complicated. Death has expenses and paperwork and phone calls. None of which I wanted to deal with. I couldn’t deal with anything. I threw away any piece of mail I got from insurance companies or from anyone else about his death. I could not deal with it for a long, long time.
I did everything right for my son. I protected him. I brought him up in the safest neighborhoods. Sent him to the right schools. I helped him through his teenage years. I thought I had the perfect formula. There is no perfect formula. You think these things happen to other people. They don’t. They can happen to anyone. These things just float around in the world, like something evil and just attach themselves to someone at random.”
