LOWELL — A pendant displaying a photo of Adrian Kimborowicz’s smiling face hung around the neck of his mother, Heidi Kimborowicz, as she shared the story of the young man’s death with people gathered outside Lowell City Hall on Friday.
She told the crowd her son was 20 years old when he was senselessly gunned down on the streets of Lowell during the early morning hours of Sept. 26, 2020. Adrian Kimborowicz fought for his life for five weeks at a Boston hospital, “never waking up,” she said.
“It’s not easy standing up here and speaking out, but if I stay quiet because it hurts to talk about it, it’s not going to help fix anything,” Heidi Kimborowicz said. “People need to hear our reality. Gun violence is now front and center in our lives. Don’t think for one second it couldn’t be knocking on your doorstep next.”
Those who gathered outside City Hall were there for the first Gun Violence Awareness Vigil to honor those who lost their lives, while opening a dialogue about gun violence. The plan is to hold a vigil each year moving forward.
At the foot of City Hall’s stairs were framed photos of other Lowell residents who lost their lives to gun violence, which, aside from Adrian Kimborowicz, included images of Nathaniel Fabian, who was also 20 when he was shot to death in Lowell in October 2021; and Cole Kinney, who was 17 when he was murdered in Derry, N.H.
Several members of Kinney’s family attended Friday’s vigil, including his mother, Kathryne Kinney, who also wore a pendant displaying a photograph of her son.
It has been almost eight years since the death of her son, but “it actually feels just like yesterday,” Kathryne Kinney said. She recites the day Cole Kinney was killed — July 20, 2016 — as if she’s said that date thousands of times before.
“It was the worst day of my life,” Kathryne Kinney said.
“We should have done this sooner than today to acknowledge everyone who has been shot and killed,” she added about the vigil. “And every day it’s a complete nightmare, but you have to move forward and be strong.”
Among those who addressed attendees on Friday was Bones Bagaunte, the offensive coordinator for the Lowell-based Massachusetts Pirates, of the Indoor Football League. Bagaunte shared his firsthand experience with gun violence.
In May 2021, Bagaunte and members of his team found themselves in the midst of a mass-shooting event that erupted at the Duck Creek Restaurant inside the Oneida Casino/Radisson Hotel & Conference Center located in Green Bay, Wisconsin. The team, in Green Bay for a game, had gone out for dinner when a gunman walked into the restaurant and started shooting.
“It was a chaotic situation,” Bagaunte said. “A lot of people made it out, but a couple people didn’t.”
The Green Bay Press Gazette reported one person was seriously injured during the shooting, while two people died, including the gunman, who was shot by police. The injured man, Daniel Mulligan, happened to be a Methuen native who was working at the restaurant, The Eagle-Tribune reported.
“It’s one of those situations where it’s hard to process what’s going on while you’re in it, and then after the fact you gotta turn a negative into a positive,” Bagaunte said. “It brought the team closer together and really put in perspective our priorities.”
At that end of that season, the team went on to win the IFL championship. Bagaunte used his team’s ability to find success after experiencing that horrifying incident as an example of the community’s need to unite to combat gun violence.
His narrative of community togetherness was repeated by other speakers, including Middlesex District Attorney Marian Ryan.
During her address, Ryan said just 24 hours earlier she had been standing in a driveway in Bedford where a 24-year-old woman shot and killed both her parents. Another 160 hours before that, Ryan said she was in a driveway in Acton, where a 49-year-old man shot his 16-year-old stepdaughter to death, before turning the gun on himself.
There have been other incidents of gun violence in between those tragedies as well, Ryan added.
“They are 100% preventable,” Ryan told the crowd. “And they are preventable because we can take what we talk about and what we hear today and we can make changes. We can make it unacceptable to get dressed, and put on your pants, your hoodie, and your gun. … We can make it unacceptable to settle an argument over nonsense — scooters, a girl, a text message — with a gun. And if that can start and change anyplace, it is right here in Lowell. It can start today. It can start by making sure there are no shootings in the city this weekend. It can start by making it completely unacceptable that people would drive around the city shooting out of car windows. And all of us have the power to make that change.”
State Rep. Rodney Elliott referenced a comment made by Ryan, telling attendees, “The consequences of gun violence last forever.”
“It seems every day there’s a senseless act of gun violence in our media, in Massachusetts and across the nation, and Massachusetts has some of the strongest and toughest gun laws in the nation,” Elliott said.
Efforts have been made among state legislators to try to put an end to gun violence. Earlier this year the Senate approved a gun bill designed to crack down on “ghost guns,” which are privately made, unserialized firearms that are largely untraceable. The bill also toughens the state’s prohibition on assault weapons and outlaws devices that convert semiautomatic firearms into fully automatic machine guns.
Heidi Kimborowicz took the time to criticize the justice system during her address, telling attendees it failed her family. Those accused of murdering Kimborowicz were both found not guilty at trial.
“Every time our police officers get illegal weapons off the streets, the justice system seems to give them a slap on the wrist and send them on their way,” Heidi Kimborowicz added. “People aren’t afraid of the justice system anymore, especially those under the age of 21.”
She encouraged people to have “real conversations with our youth before they start venturing off into their teen years and are influenced by their peers.”
“We need to teach empathy if it’s not being taught at home,” Heidi Kimborowicz said. “We need to have open dialogues with the youth at our schools. But parents, please don’t leave it up to the educators. Start these discussions at home. Talk to your kids, stay involved, ask questions, know who their friends are. We need to do better. You don’t want to be the next mother or father standing here planning your child’s funeral.”
Attendees of Friday’s vigil wore orange in honor of “Wear Orange Weekend.” The campaign was started by the family of 15-year-old Hadiya Pendleton, who was shot and killed on a playground in Chicago in January 2013.
Following the tragedy, Pendleton’s friends commemorated her life by wearing orange, the vivid color worn by hunters in the woods to avoid being gunned down by fellow hunters.
For more about the Wear Orange campaign, visit weareorange.org.
Follow Aaron Curtis on X, formerly known as Twitter, @aselahcurtis
