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 Shannon Sharpe defends his friend and teammate, Ray Lewis.
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Wednesday, January 24
Super Bowl brings back bad memories
Associated Press
AKRON, Ohio -- Far from the Super Bowl, and all the pregame
talk and partying, Cindy Lollar Owens had something else to do.
She was placing flowers at the grave of her slain nephew.
|  | | Cindy Lollar Owens poses with a photo collage of her slain nephew, Richard Lollar. |
"It's hard," she said. "I used to bring one or two of my
children with me, but it's too depressing. But I try to go there as
often as I can."
She visited the grave on Tuesday, just as Ray Lewis was in
Tampa, Fla., discussing his role in two stabbing deaths hours
after last year's Super Bowl at Atlanta.
Almost a year has passed since 24-year-old Richard Lollar and
his friend, 21-year-old Jacinth Baker, died outside an Atlanta
nightclub.
Lewis was initially charged with the killings. But under an
agreement with prosecutors, the Baltimore Ravens' star linebacker
pleaded guilty to misdemeanor obstruction of justice. He testified
against his two former co-defendants, who were acquitted.
Now the anniversary of the killings coincides with Lewis' return
to the Super Bowl, this time as a player, not a spectator.
"The media keeps talking about the anniversary," Lollar Owens
said. "But the thing is, we've' been fighting it for a whole year.
It slowed down some, but we're still fighting."
Lewis survived his hour on center stage Tuesday during the big
media gathering at the Super Bowl. He sidestepped questions about
his involvement in the slayings, repeating he still doesn't know
who is responsible. He contends he was a victim of a system that
targets celebrities.
Two grieving families feel otherwise.
They're unsatisfied and stunned that two young men could be left
dead in the street and no one is in jail paying for the crime. They
have plenty of questions they want answered from the NFL, the
Atlanta district attorney's office and Lewis.
"I'd like to talk to him privately, just me and him, no strings
attached," Lollar Owens said.
Lollar Owens, along with her mother, Joyce, raised Richard
Lollar from the time he was 2. As she talks about him in the living
room of her Akron home, Lollar Owens stares at two huge photo
collages of her nephew.
There's a picture of 10-year-old Richard wearing a Cleveland
Browns jersey. There's another of him and his eight brothers and
sisters. There's a shot of the award-winning hairstylist who
dreamed of opening his own shop. There's one of Richard's daughter,
India, born one month after his death.
Lollar Owens wants a more thorough look at this case. She's
planning to go to the Super Bowl in Tampa to protest and to Atlanta
on Monday.
"A lot of people don't know the extent of the evidence that was
presented," she said.
As for Lewis, she thinks he knows a lot more than he's
admitting.
"A witness is someone who comes forward, someone who sees
something, someone who hears something," she said. "If he's just
a witness it should be very easy for him to talk about it."
Lollar Owens is frustrated by the trial in Atlanta. She can't
understand why so many witnesses seemed to change their stories
once they got on the stand. She's haunted by visions of her nephew
held against a tree as a knife plunges repeatedly into his chest.
Oddly, all the attention on Lewis has helped her cope with the
loss.
"When I see him I think of my nephew," she said. "It makes me
feel good when they mention my nephew's name and Baker's name along
with Ray Lewis. That's the only good feeling I get."
Other family members are still mourning and can't talk about
Richard's death.
"It's a shame," she said. "This has become my life. It
doesn't make any sense ... They took the best person in our
family."
She said Baker persuaded her nephew to move to Atlanta because
of more business opportunities than in Akron. She said he had
turned his life around following three minor drug offenses and was
looking forward to becoming a father.
Lollar Owens has established a memorial fund in her nephew's
behalf and one day hopes to build a barber shop in his honor.
"I want it to be something exquisite," she said. "That's my
dream, to fulfill his dream. And I know he'll feel good about it."
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