Jessica Ludwig fought through her voice cracking.
She continued speaking through the tears that followed down her face.
Ludwig’s daughter, Jillian, died in November allegedly at the hands of a man the court had previously declared mentally incompetent. A bullet struck her daughter while she took a walk two blocks from the campus of Belmont University. Jillian was on the ground for an hour before anyone found her. Her family sat through what they described as an agonizing flight before landing in Nashville, only knowing their daughter had been shot.
She died shortly thereafter.
Her mother said she wasn’t going to let her daughter’s last moments on earth be her only legacy — the only memory others thought about.
“She was ripped away during the prime of her life,” Ludwig said during a House Criminal Justice Committee, where lawmakers sent forward a bill that would close a loophole in Tennessee law around those deemed mentally incompetent by the court. She addressed legislators wearing a white shirt bearing Jillian’s name in bright colors asking for justice, a locket of her photo sitting atop her collar.