Group Helps Keep Alive Memory of Many Victims of Violent Death

The Rev. Larry Tyler-Wayman stood in the dreary mist of Plaza Park on Sunday afternoon and somberly read a roll call of two dozen names.

But no one answered “present” to this particular roll call. Because every name Tyler-Wayman read off was that of someone, usually young, who had died violently in Ventura County in 1997.

After pronouncing each name, he spoke the same words: “On June 14 . . . killed . . . on June 25 . . . killed . . . on July 11 . . . killed . . .”

Tyler-Wayman heads up the Faith Connection, a loosely knit group of people from various faiths around Ventura County who come together to lend support when tragedy hits. The Faith Connection makes a practice of showing up at the scene of a violent death to stand silently, pray and comfort anyone who needs it.

“Our purpose is not to have people get religion,” Tyler-Wayman said. “It’s to connect and help each other remember our loved ones. And to ask ourselves, ‘How can we keep this from happening?’ What we want to prevent is the next vigil.”

Tyler-Wayman said the group has held more than 40 spontaneous vigils throughout Ventura County in recent years. At a Texaco station. On a highway shoulder. In a front yard. In a billiard parlor.

Violent death has no particular address.

Sunday’s vigil was to remember all those who died in 1997. A dozen people silently surrounded Tyler-Wayman, all holding lit candles with hands protectively cupped around the flames. The people with candles were family members and friends of some of those who died tragically in the county.

The overriding message, said the group’s leader: Attention must be paid.

Relatives of Felipe Flores, who was fatally shot in Oxnard on Nov. 15, wore buttons with his picture, and a sister held a gilt-framed portrait of the young man.

“It is of him in black tie when he was best man at his brother’s wedding,” said Yolanda Flores. “I just got it back Friday.”

Virginia Banuelos of Oxnard still attends vigils even though her son, Martin, was killed on Sept. 28, 1995.

“He was walking to a friend’s house on a Thursday afternoon to play football,” she said. “Now I come to get together and talk. It helps with the pain. We console each other.”

Tyler-Wayman, who also is the regular pastor of the North Oxnard United Methodist Church, agreed that consolation is a key purpose.

“Sometimes ministers need to make sure the family of victims aren’t feeling alone or abandoned,” he said.

Then, to the group at large, he said, “For me, the 23rd Psalm can help at a time like this. Will you please say it with me?”

In the dusk, holding their flickering candles, the group began to recite.

For information on the Faith Connection, call 485-0778.