Family, friends remember Jahmari Rice as humorous, hardworking

Jahmari Rice was always hustling — for odd jobs, to be the best-dressed kid on the block, to make the varsity football team.

And as he chased his dreams, friends and family said, the 15-year-old was relentlessly positive and passionate.

He brought friends and teammates joy on and off the field. That's why a crimson Richfield High School football jersey emblazoned with the number 53 hung next to his coffin at Hope Presbyterian Church in Richfield on Wednesday.

Mourners gathered for his funeral wore T-shirts that resembled the uniform so that, as Hope Church's Young Life area developer Cesar Castillejos said, "We can all wear the jersey Jahmari was pursuing."

Rice was shot and killed outside South Education Center on Feb. 1, just days after he transferred to the alternative school from Richfield High.

Two fellow students, 19-year-old Alfredo Rosario Solis and 18-year-old Fernando Valdez-Alvarez, have been arrested and each charged one count of aiding and abetting second-degree murder and two counts of attempted second-degree murder in connection with the shooting outside the school that killed Rice and critically wounded a 17-year-old student. Another 19-year-old student suffered minor injuries, but was not hit by the gunfire, which police say erupted amid a dispute between students.

David Lenz, lead pastor at Hope Church, said Rice spent lots of time there with the Young Life chapter.

"This is where he played basketball. It's where his friends are," Lenz said.

Rice's father, Cortez Rice, spoke to the tragedies of gun violence and implored those gathered to hold their loved ones close.

"As a parent, this is real heartbreak," Rice said. "You will never know when it will be yours."

Even as mourners celebrated Rice's life, teens intermittently checked their cellphones to learn of another boy shot earlier in the day in Minneapolis. Speakers urged public officials to address the epidemic of gun violence in the metro area.

"Help me honor Jahmari so another Jahmari doesn't fall through the cracks," said Jalilia Abdul-Brown, a pastor and violence prevention specialist with Hennepin Healthcare.

Family members at the funeral spoke of the way they saw TV news reports and social media about the shooting in Richfield, connecting the dots as the day went on that the tragedy was at Jahmari Rice's new school.

His aunt Jasmine Hollins recalled how Rice had told his grandmother "I love you" five times before he left the house that morning.

No matter who he was with, Jahmari always strove to be a calming, positive presence, others said.

Antwane Ruiz met Rice in middle school and remembers the way he'd pushed Ruiz to pursue soccer in high school. Ruiz was a starter for the Richfield High's boys soccer team this season.

"That's just the kind of guy he was," Ruiz said. "He supported me in pursuit of my goals."

Bishop Richard D. Howell Jr. of Shiloh Temple delivered the eulogy and said Rice's family remembers him as a young man with an infectious smile and voracious appetite. The teen loved sneaking late-night snacks and it was common to find empty potato-chip bags strewn across his bedroom.

Rice also had a knack for fashion and was particular about his hair, keeping it short — a fade with a perfectly horizontal line at the top of his forehead.

"He always had to look sharp for somebody," Howell said. "He was that kind of 15-year-old kid."

Hope Church provided about 650 chairs for Wednesday's gathering, Lenz said. Most of the mourners first visited Rice's ivory coffin, topped with red roses.

Friends and family said the turnout was a testament to Rice's impact on the Richfield community.

"There will never be another Jahmari Kei'Fee Rice," his father said.