Folks arrived by the dozens Thursday night to GORC Park in Anne Arundel County, carrying balloons and candles for a vigil in remembrance of Isaiah Olugbemi, a boxer murdered in Odenton last week.
A massive crowd gathered at the center of one of the park’s fields, praying and remembering the slain young athlete.
“This has been a devastating loss for our family,” Adewale Oparinde, an in-law of Olugbemi’s, told a group of reporters.
“This is a man that had so much potential and had so much going for him, and his life was cut short,” Tolu Oparinde, Olugbemi’s cousin, said.
“And so, we are devastated as a family. We are sad, and we really want justice to be brought to this man that did this to our family,” Oparinde added.
Police charging documents say 36-year-old Nicholas Francis Giroux approached Olugbemi and shot him until he fell to the ground last week, while Olugbemi was standing outside on Meadow Mist Way in Odenton.
Giroux, the documents say, confessed to police and is now facing first- and second-degree murder charges.