GULFPORT, Miss — As family and friends walked into the Lyman Community Center in Gulfport Wednesday, Jayla Agee knew it wasn’t going to be easy.
“When I walk in there to see his body, it’s going to hit me hard and I’m not going to be the same,” said Agee as she was preparing to go inside.
Agee had dated 15-year-old Jaheim McMillan. She saw him just weeks before he was shot in the head by a Gulfport police officer October 6.
“All I did was cry,” said Agee.
McMillan’s funeral Wednesday was an emotional one.
“He was there for me a lot and I was there for him, and I hate how they just took him from me and everybody else like that because it just happened out of nowhere,” said Agee.
Gulfport police say McMillian and a group of other teens were pointing guns at cars. When officers approached them right outside a Family Dollar store, police say McMillian was ordered to stop and put down his gun.
“McMillan did not comply,” said Police Chief Adam Cooper in the days after the shooting. “McMillan turned both his body and his weapon towards the officer. The officer fired at McMillan.”
Since the shooting there have been protests calling for transparency form the Gulfport police Department and the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation, which is handling the case. Family and friends don’t believe the police account and want any video released.
“We’re just trying to get the truth and the truth is on the footage, the police body cam and the Family Dollar,” said protester Reginald Virgil.
Questions of what exactly happened have spread across social media with calls for justice and scrutiny. Wednesday though, was day to focus on the memories.
“He was a nice and caring person. He always made us laugh,” said McMillan’s friend Malachi Young.
It’s those memories that make this loss so hard to deal with.
“It was unbelievable because, like, why. Why would you do something like that especially to a child,” said Agee. “He was only 15, still had a life ahead of him and you took that away from him, not caring, you just did it carelessly.”
Four other teenagers were also arrested in this case, charged with aggravated assault. Eyewitness News reached out to the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation for more information on this case or to get an idea of when more would be released. As of Wednesday afternoon, we had not heard back.