NEW ORLEANS — The parents of Jezreel Poleate, the young woman killed during the mass shooting Sunday night, are imploring city leaders to do something to curb this violence. They're asking why their only daughter was snatched from them before she had a chance to show the world who she was.
Jezreel is a biblical name. It is the name her mother Sharon Poleate chose for her only daughter. It's a name she's still calling, but now there's no response.
"I pass her room. She wears a certain cologne. I don't even want to go in her room, but you can smell it, you still smell that scent, the Jezreel scent like no other," she told WWL Louisiana Tuesday.
Sitting together only two days after their daughter was violently snatched from them, Sharon and Gary are trying to understand why this tragedy happened to their family. "She was my baby, she was my baby, not just my daughter, she was my baby girl," said Gary Poleate
He says he and Jezreel had a special bond, one only a father and daughter share. "I've been married for 34 years, but I've been a father to her for 24 years, and now one of the two women in my life is gone."
For Valentine's Day he would buy both his special ladies something, he said, "We fished together, I taught her to fish, I taught her to swim, she loved all of those things, and we would do it together sometimes. We'd fish. She always wanted to dress up... do her face, do her nails."
Come Jezreel's 25th birthday in September, she won't be there to celebrate with her parents and three brothers, whom she left behind.
NOPD says a mass shooting happened minutes before midnight Sunday outside Republic Nola, a nightclub on South Peters Street in the CBD. Police say Jezreel was killed and 11 were injured and Mrs. Poleate said, "She was waiting to get in, waiting to get in, and never made it in."
Then just after midnight came a call no mother ever wants to get. "She called and she said, and she had a trembling in her voice. She said, 'Is this Jezreel's mama?' I said, 'Yeah. What, what, what?' She said, 'Jezreel is dead.' Oh lord, that first call. When I got that call, that's a call I'd never have for my child."
A call that keeps replaying, over and over again in her mind, Mr. Poleate said, "I want to hug her, I want to fuss at her, but she's not there."
Their smiling daughter and their only daughter, Mrs. Poleate said, "You would know she's in the room, you really would because she would just light up the room."
Mr. Poleate said, "I had hopes for my daughter, I had hopes for her life, getting her married to having children, to have grandchildren, you think about those things, now they won't be happening."
No longer here and her seat at the dining table now empty.
The family will hold a Stop The Violence Balloon Release in Honor of Jezreel Poleate on Sunday, April 14, at 10 a.m.
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