Friends and family gathered on Sunday to remember a Maryland mother who was enjoying a night out with friends when she was gunned down.
Mariah Logan, 27, was one of two people shot and killed in White Plains early Friday when two men got into a fight outside of Jammie’s Paddock on Crain Highway just after midnight, according to the Charles County Sheriff’s Office. Investigators said they exchanged gunfire and a bullet went into the bar, striking the mother of three.
“She didn’t deserve this. What happened? I mean, I just didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know what to think, what to do. I just thought it was unreal,” the victim’s mother, Kenyatta Ellis, said.
One of the men involved in the fight, 36-year-old Paul Ernest Fleming, was also fatally wounded.
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Deputies arrested 45-year-old James Coffen for first- and second-degree murder.
Sunday evening, dozens of people gathered on the family’s front lawn, lighting candles and holding red and black balloons. Through hymns and prayers, they honored a life cut short.
“[I feel like] I lost my best friend, my only sister. I’m hurt, I’m angry. Everything,” Diamond Logan-Ellis, the victim’s sister, said.
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Days after Logan’s death, her grieving mother searches for answers and holds on to memories.
“She loved to sing. She loved singing,” she said. “Her children were her life, and she just was Mariah. Everybody knew –she was Mariah.”
While her family mourns and looks for justice, they are also praying for strength.
“I’m numb. I’m angry. And, you know, I’m just like, it’s not fair. That’s what I’m feeling,” Termetrice Wilson, Logan’s grandmother, said.
Logan leaves behind three young children, ages 9, 6 and 4.
“It was very hard for me to sit there and tell three children that their mother won't come back. That’s the worst thing I could ever do, the hardest thing I could ever say to my grandchildren. But I had to do it. But hopefully, you know, justice will prevail,” Logan’s father, Theodore Ellis, said.
