NEW ORLEANS – For the second time this week, students from schools across New Orleans are taking to the streets, marching and calling for an end to gun violence.
Friday’s march was organized by New Orleans Job Corps Youth 2 Youth ambassadors and coincides with the International Day of Peace.
At 10 a.m., the Kennedy High School Marching Band and organizers began their march on the corner of Tulane and S. Jefferson Davis Parkway. Immediately following the march, a Peace Festival was scheduled which included local law enforcement and anti-violence organizations.
Lucretia Peters lost her brother Shawn Lemon to gun violence in 1992.
"People are ingrained in our hearts and when we lose someone it remains with you," she said. "That's a scar on your heart that never goes away ... On birthdays, holidays, there's always something, someone that's not there so something is always missing."
Friday's event comes one day after students at Eleanor McMain School held their own peace march in memory of 15-year-old Chance Smith who was shot and killed in a recent crime.
