Watch: St. Columba church honors 2020 Oakland homicide victims

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In an annual ceremony, priests at St. Columba Catholic Church were joined by Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf and others in reading aloud the names of 97 homicide victims who were killed in the city in 2020.

Another five victims were also honored in the ceremony, but unnamed because next of kin had yet to be notified of their deaths, which took place between December 19 and Dec. 31.

From the church’s front lawn, priests and attendees lifted 97 white crosses painted with the names, ages and death dates of each victim and placed them at the altar. Five more crosses were left blank to represent the late December homicide victims who went unnamed.

Rich Laufenberg has made the crosses for the last dozen or so years and coordinated the COVID-impacted memorial this year. When the church first organized the ceremony, Laufenberg started to help them supplement their cross supply because it was running out.

“A friend of ours told my wife and me that they were running out of crosses, and I said ’Oh, I can make crosses ‘til the cows come home,” said Laufenberg, who calls himself a wood butcher. “Thirteen years later, the cows haven’t come home yet.”

Last year was the first year for which Laufenberg saw an increase in the number of crosses he had to make. Though he added that he did make crosses this year for homicide victims of past years because relatives only recently found out about the memorial, 2020 was Oakland’s deadliest year in close to a decade.

“This is disheartening,” Father Aidan McAleenan said at the ceremony, which several city and church leaders attended, including: Schaaf, Father Jayson Landeza of St. Benedict’s Catholic Church and Oakland Police Department chaplain, Oakland bishops Michael Barber and John S. Cummins, the Rev. Angela Brown, OPD Captain Paul Figueroa and Guillermo Cespedes from the city’s Violence Prevention Taskforce.

Before reading 10 of the 97 names aloud, Mayor Schaaf thanked those who she said worked tirelessly to bring peace to Oakland streets and comfort to those who lost loved ones. She also questioned the nationwide response to violence, which spiked in cities across the United States in 2020 amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

“I have to ask myself, like I know so many others here today, together, do: How we as a nation haven’t been able to mobilize with such speed and seriousness [as] to confront this COVID virus, this COVID pandemic, when we have been living with the pandemic of violence in our nation’s cities for generations,” Schaaf said. “Why isn’t it that we can’t develop an emergency vaccination to heal? Because let us be clear: This is an illness that is coming from our society and the very institutions themselves, and this is what we must heal and fix.”

Before pandemic-related shutdowns in March, Cespedes said the city was on pace for a record reduction in the homicide rate.

“COVID interruption, violence interruption, the issue of racial equity, and intimate partner violence have all become an issue that needed to be addressed simultaneously,” Cespedes said as he credited Schaaf for a swift shift in the city’s response for those issues. “It is not just COVID. It was COVID, it was a country that was going through some historical changes prompted by George Floyd and the demonstrations that came afterward, the rise in consciousness across the country about racial inequities and being faced with high rates of unemployment and a rise in intimate partner violence. All of that has created this perfect storm that has led to an increase in homicides.”

Oakland Police recorded a 38 percent increase in homicides year over year, according to Cespedes. Figueroa spoke to the impact that the increase will have on the city for years to come.

“It’s just devastating,” Figueroa said, referring to personal experience with the loss of loved ones as well as other officers’ daily encounters with the families and friends of Oakland’s homicide victims. “Birthdays pass, and you’re always, the memories come up of our loved ones and the good times that we had, and that pain never really goes away. So all we can do is hope to be that positive ripple in the water, moving forward so we can prevent as many [homicides] as possible. … Just seeing those crosses there is a reminder that their loved ones are not forgotten.”

Below is a list of first names of 2020 Oakland homicide victims we documented as represented in the St. Columba ceremony. Please reach out if you know more about the four others not listed here or the five victims killed between December 19 and 31 who have not been named yet.

1. Hasan
2. Sean
3. Charles
4. David
5. Miguel
6. Eric
7. Deandre
8. Sean
9. Jalain
10. Franklin
11. Anika
12. Lamont
13. Rasheen
14. Justin
15. Antonio
16. Marcus
17. Henry
18. Miles
19. Kendrick
20. Jose
21. Henry
22. Bruce
23. Dayvon
24. Ivan
25. Dadesi
26. Pedro
27. Mauray
28. Gary
29. Ernesto
30. Francisco
31. Markese
32. Stephon
33. Robert
34. Jeffrey
35. Darin
36. Ricardo
37. Kenneth
38. Joseph
39. Quinton
40. Hung
41. Peter
42. Darius
43. Esteban
44. Jesus
45. Sergio
46. Noell
47. Davaun
48. Zavier
49. Alfredo
50. Brianna
51. Quennel
52. Karongie
53. Preston
54. Jesus
55. Daniel
56. Kendale
57. Nadia
58. Rivelino
59. Carlos
60. Lajuan
61. Donte
62. Arvin
63. Aaron
64. Jaleel
65. Daniel
66. Noel
67. Lance
68. Jorge
69. Juan
70. Yu-Chien
71. Michael
72. Elijah
73. Jorge
74. Alvin
75. Todd
76. Kenneth
77. Brian
78. Eduardo
79. Reginald
80. Kevin
81. Madalyn
82. Andre
83. Silas
84. Stefan
85. Charles
86. Gerald
87. Jose
88. Aleea
89. James
90. Aujihnae
91. Parrish
92. Terrence
93. Edgar