Jeremy Richman and Jennifer Hensel lost their 6-year-old daughter, Avielle, in the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre on December 14, 2012. Unfortunately, Richman never could find the peace and closure needed to heal. According to The Washington Post, authorities said the body of Jeremy Richman, 49, was found at about 7 a.m. at Edmond Town Hall in Newtown on Monday, March 25.
Richman was discovered dead of an apparent suicide at the office of the Avielle Foundation, which is located in the Edmond Town Hall, an event space in downtown Newtown, Connecticut.
For more than 6 years, they have had to wake up to the agony and reality that Avielle is no longer with them. In her honor, Jeremy Richman and his wife started a foundation in her name that pushed for research into the origins of violent behavior in the brain. But it seems Richman could not find a way to heal his broken heart.
“It’s a tragedy with Jeremy,” said Neil Heslin, whose 6-year-old son Jesse was killed at Sandy Hook. “We’re all heartbroken, you know. Your heart’s broken forever. It’s something you live with, you deal with. And Jeremy was dealing with it too.”
Heslin said that in the aftermath of the Dec. 14, 2012, mass shooting that left 20 first-graders and six school staffers dead, he saw Richman often at memorials and on a trip to Washington to lobby legislators to ban Richman’s death sent a shudder through Newtown, which is still healing more than six years after the mass shooting and where the locals say “12-14,” the date of the shooting, to refer to what Lanza wrought.
If you or someone you know is in crisis, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 800-273-8255, text TALK to 741741 or visit SpeakingOfSuicide.com/resources for additional resources.
