What do you do when you fight to ensure your child is a respectable, productive individual who is loved and gives love, but he is murdered anyway? You fight some more.
Melquain was my only child. I carried him for nine months and raised him 27 years and four days. He was an intelligent, charismatic, empathetic, witty young man. He used to help others to pass the exam for a GED.
Yet he was still murdered at a bus stop. I forgot to teach him that pain and hurt lives in many others’ hearts, which will make their hearts black and despise you, even if they don’t know you.
Now I’m left to wake up in a home to the air and wind. I have to help raise his daughter, who was born one and a half months after his murder. In order to survive, I have to give back in his name. I established the Melquain Jatelle Anderson Foundation: Fighting Against Gun Violence Via Education, and I implemented scholarships and emergency funds at the college where he earned his associate degree and the college he was attending at his demise. I try to help survivors and save others from being murdered or imprisoned due to gun violence.