ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. – A vigil scheduled to remember a three-year-old shot and killed in a drive-by shooting was abruptly canceled on Thursday out of concerns about safety.
The vigil honoring Daquane Felix was set to begin at 6:30 p.m. in Orlando’s Clear Lake Park, and Orlando police vehicles provided security, but family members told News 6 the child’s mother and father were too fearful to venture out.
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“We were hoping to join this vigil to bring closure and healing to not only the family that’s been victimized by the senseless violence that we have going on but also just trying to bring some sense of serenity to a community that’s wreaking havoc right now over what’s going on,” said Bishop Kelvin Cobaris.
Orange County sheriff’s investigators said the three-year-old was killed on Tuesday night.
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The boy’s grandmother told News 6 Daquane was playing in the front room of their home on Drexel Avenue in Pine Hills when bullets flew through the walls.
She said her grandson was hit in the head.
Investigators pronounced him dead at the scene, and they’re still searching for the people responsible.
Crimeline is offering a $5,000 reward for information leading to an arrest.
“When is it gonna stop? Where is it going to stop?” asked Tia Rowe.
Rowe said she hoped to remember the child at the vigil, but instead, she was getting in her car to leave when it was canceled.
She said she knows the child’s grandmothers, and she hopes his mother will get justice.
“If anybody knows anything, now is the time to talk,” she said. “This young lady is trying to bury her son. She can’t bury her son, she can’t mourn her son, there’s too much violence in the world.”
If you have information about the killing of Daquane Felix, call Crimeline at 1-800-423-8477 (TIPS).