Months after going through the horrific Valentine’s Day shooting in Parkland, Florida, survivors Elama Ali and her brother are facing another emotionally scarring incident with the death of their father.
The tragedy in February, which ended the life of 17 students and staff members at Stoneman Douglas High School, turned many of the surviving students, including 16-year-old Elama herself, into crusaders fighting for stricter gun laws.
Last week, Elama’s dad Ayub Ali became the victim of another senseless firearm killing after he was shot by a robber at Aunt Molly’s Food Store, CNN reports.
Ali came face to face with his killer who entered his store on Tuesday afternoon and pointed a gun at him.
While he immediately left after taking money from the cash register, the gunman returned and fatally shot him.
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“If you came for the money, take the money and go,” Ali’s wife, Farhana, lamented. “Why did you have to kill my husband?”
“The reason we moved to Parkland was because he liked the school,” Elama was quoted as saying. “I didn’t want to move here. But he told us, ‘We are only moving because the school is amazing.'”
Ali was the family’s only provider. He was only 61 when he was killed.
Originally from Bangladesh, Ali arrived in the United States in the late 1990s. He and his family moved to Parkland in 2017, just when it was named Florida’s safest city.
While the tragic shooting at Marjory Douglas made him worry about his children’s safety, Ali did not have much of an option but to stay.
As the father to one daughter and three sons, he worked hard to ensure the needs of his family were met.
According to Elama, her dad had been supportive of her activism, allowing her to travel to Washington, DC, for the “March for Our Lives” rally which took place a month after the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting.
“He took me where I wanted to go,” Elama said. “When I was in Washington, he asked about it. He watched it on TV.”
The surveillance video taken from the crime has since been released but the police have yet to make any arrests.
Featured Image via YouTube / CBS News
