The family of Kijuan Byrd (pictured), a 28-year-old electrician who was shot dead outside of a Miami strip club earlier this month, is demanding that the security guard who shot him be arrested.
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On June 1, police say that Byrd was shot six times by a security guard outside of Club Lexx in Miami. “He’s my baby, my young son,” Donald Byrd said. “He was shot twice in the back. He was going to try to get away.”
In his defense, the security guard is using Florida’s “Stand Your Ground Law.”
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Michael Smathers, a friend of Kijuan, was also shot on the night in question and is in critical condition, according to an attorney representing the family. Kijuan’s mother, Arleen Byrd, said during a press conference on Friday that she doesn’t know how she is going to break the news to her grandchildren that their father is gone.
“Kijuan is my only child and now he’s gone, he’s gone. My baby is dead, and it’s senseless,” said Arleen Byrd. “I don’t understand why, and I don’t know what I’m going to tell my grand babies when they say to me, ‘Grandma, where’s my daddy?’ I don’t know what I’m going to say. My son is gone, and I’m angry.”
SEE ALSO: 13-Year-Old Shot Dead By 75-Year-Old Next Door Neighbor
NBC Miami 6 reports that Benjamin Crump, the same attorney who represents Trayvon Martin‘s family, is representing the Byrd family.
“Again we are here with another stand your ground claim and another unarmed black man shot and killed and nobody arrested,” said attorney Benjamin Crump.
Here is a copy of Byrd’s obituary that was printed in the Miami Herald on June 7.
