Nikitia Bryant’s family ready for closure

FORT PIERCE, Florida. Nikitia Bryant’s family continues to mourn the loss of their 29-year-old mother, who was killed in a mass shooting on Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

“Before he missed the mark, the boot hadn’t dropped yet,” Bryant’s brother Calvin Bethel said Thursday. “But right now I’m at a point where it starts to kind of – well, it doesn’t even start – it hits me. It’s hitting right now.”

Bethel feels the pain of losing her sister.

“It’s not just for me,” he said. “It hits my brother. It hits my mom hard — hard on my mom.”

Bryant was shot and killed spending Martin Luther King Jr. Day with his daughter at Ealous Ellis Park in Fort Pierce. She was one of eight people were shot that day in a park near Avenue M and 13th Street.

She was buried last weekend but disappointment remains for family members still waiting to close. Nearly a month later, no one is in custody in connection with the shooting.

“I know the investigation will take time,” Bethel said. “But just as you don’t know, I don’t know either. All I get is, ‘Hey, we’re looking into this.'”

James Bailey / WPTV

WPTV spoke to the St. Lucie Sheriff’s Office, which is investigating. MPs said there were no updates on the case.

St. Lucie County Commissioners on Tuesday approved construction funding security cameras on the boat ramp and in several parksincluding Ealous Ellis Park.

“I can’t guarantee that this past event would have happened, but obviously it would give us another, you know, source of information that was immediately recorded, that is, indisputable evidence of who was involved and what happened”, About This was stated by Deputy Chief of the Saint Lucie County Sheriff’s Office Brian Hester.

Bethel cannot understand why it took so long.

“This is more sad than disappointing and I know it will probably surprise a lot of people,” he said. “But it’s more sad than upsetting because, for example, someone has died. It took the death of my sister – the death of my mother’s daughter – for us to get some cameras.”

Security cameras will also be installed at Pepper Park, Lakewood Park, Lonewood Stadium and the Stan Blum Boat Ramp.