Shooting victim's mother grateful for community support
BY ZIVA BRANSTETTER World Enterprise Editor
Wednesday, January 16, 2013
1/16/13 at 2:42 PM
Get the latest news on the Fairmont Terrace homicides: Read coverage of the apartment complex killings and on other homicides in the area nearby.
Cheryl Nunley said she has been overwhelmed at the support she has received following the shooting death of her daughter and three other women last week and is encouraged by an apparent break in the case.
“The amount of people who have stepped up, it has just been amazing,” Nunley told the Tulsa World on Wednesday.
Services have been set for noon Saturday at Southern Hills Baptist Church for Misty Nunley, 33.
Misty Nunley was one of four women shot to death Jan. 7 at the Fairmont Terrace apartments near 61st Street and Peoria Avenue.
Misty Nunley was staying with twin sisters Rebeika Powell, 23, and Kayetie Powell Melchor, 23, who were also killed at the apartment. The fourth victim, 55-year-old Julie Jackson, was a neighbor who had reportedly gone to check on the girls.
Rebeika Powell’s 3-year-old son was found unharmed in the apartment following the killings.
Funeral services for the other victims have already been held.
No arrests in the killings have been made, but prosecutors say a Tulsa Jail inmate, Freddie Allen Hayes, 32, is being held on other charges and is a “person of interest” in the case.
Hayes’ bond was increased from $11,000 to $250,000 Tuesday, and new charges of carrying a concealed weapon and drug possession were filed against him, records show.
Cheryl Nunley said Southern Hills Baptist Church offered to hold services for her daughter after hearing about the family’s financial difficulties.
“They have so graciously donated their time and their effort,” Nunley said of church officials.
“They have done this all out of the kindness of their heart. We don’t even go to church there.”
Nunley said officials at Marshall Elementary School and a Tulsa barber shop have also collected donations to help pay for funeral expenses.
“I was absolutely overwhelmed. We don’t have much money, and when all this first came out, they really dehumanized my daughter,” Nunley said.
She said that although her daughter had a criminal record in her past, “she wasn’t a ne’er-do-well ex-convict that they made her out to be on TV. She is a person who is so, so loved and will be so missed.”
Nunley said she is encouraged by news that police have identified Hayes as a person of interest in the case.
“I made my daughter and my grandchildren a promise that I would do everything in my power to find out who took her away from us. She’s not ever going to be forgotten. … This is not going to go unpunished.”
Read more on this story in Thursday's Tulsa World.
Associated Images:
Misty Nunley. Courtesy
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