'Ruth did not die in vain': Shooting victim's memorial urges change, shares memories

"We're not going quietly into the night," Garnell W. Whitfield Jr. said to a packed Mt. Olive Baptist Church Saturday. "My mother deserves more than that."

"Ruth did not die in vain," echoed Rev. Al Sharpton, a vocal civil rights advocate who attended several of the victims' funerals.

"Enough is enough," said Vice President Kamala Harris, urging a stop to the violence that's taken place in Buffalo and Texas the last two weeks.

Saturday's memorial was the final funeral of the 10 victims of the May 14 massacre, and Harris' attendance along with second gentleman Douglas Emhoff made it the highest-profile. New York City Mayor Eric Adams, Assembly Majority Leader Crystal D. Peoples-Stokes, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul and state Attorney General Letitia James were among the other major figures to attend.

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Before the service, the Whitfield family, including Garnell, his brother Raymond Anthony and two sisters Robin Harris and Angela Crawley, met with the vice president privately, Buffalo Mayor Byron W. Brown told reporters.

Not only did Harris console the Whitfield family, Brown said, but also the youths among Ruth Whitfield's grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Family members of the other nine shooting victims also met with the vice president, the Buffalo mayor confirmed.

In an impassioned eulogy, Sharpton spoke about a dire need for change, especially in regard to gun laws. The founder of the National Action Network demanded more stringent identification required for purchasing guns and background checks before purchasing assault weapons like AR-15s. Adams, following the memorial, urged more accountability for and attention to what's posted on social media after the gunman livestreamed his act.

Mourners also spoke about who Ruth Whitfield was: a God-fearing woman who overcame a lack of formal education and financial stability in her childhood to become "an intelligent, articulate, proud, strong Black woman who unapologetically advocated for her family and for 'the least of these,' " according to an obituary written by her children.

She had style too.

Whitfield loved to shop at thrift stores and had a sharp sense of fashion, recalled Peoples-Stokes and Rev. George Woodruff, previously the pastor of Durham Memorial AME Zion Church that the Whitfield family attended.

"I always remember her as always sharply dressed, impeccably dressed," said Peoples-Stokes.

Whitfield was born in Jackson, Miss., but spent much of her life in Buffalo. She was married to Garnell Whitfield Sr. for 68 years and worshipped at Durham Memorial her entire married life. "Her children were the joy of her life," her obituary read. She enjoyed cooking Southern staples like macaroni and cheese, collard greens and homemade syrup and biscuits for them. Her dedication to her family was infinite: she visited her husband in the nursing home every day for the last eight years, including the day she died.

Garnell Whitfield Jr., Ruth Whitfield's son who is a retired Buffalo fire commissioner, described the final time he saw his mother, the day before the shooting. He'd visited her house to work on a raised planter box he was going to give her for Mother's Day. She watched him build it briefly and said she'd buy seeds to plant in the dirt he was laying.

"Mom knew something that I didn't know," he said. "She wasn't trying to grow seeds in that box. She was tending her seeds all her life. She knew her fruit had ripened, that it was mature."