Tallahassee Prayer Vigil Today for Perry Street Shooting Victims After FAMU Homecoming

Pastor Stanley Walker sat by a hospital bed and prayed over a 17-year-old girl who had been shot in the back of the head. On Wednesday night, he told the people gathered at his church that Kaybreeyanna “KayKay” King had signalled to him that she heard his prayer, and the room that had come to grieve a shooting began to pray for a healing instead.

Just days after 11 people were struck by gunfire in a mass shooting on Perry Street, a prayer vigil was held at Tabernacle Missionary Baptist Church in Tallahassee on 29 October 2026, the Tallahassee Democrat reported. Nearly 50 community members gathered for prayers and song, led by Walker, with other pastors stepping up to the altar seperately to pray over the families and over the city.

The shooting occured on 24 October, after the Florida A&M University homecoming game ended. King, 17, was among those shot on Perry Street, near the university's Bragg Memorial Stadium. Police said six of the 11 people shot were juveniles, and reports said the youngest victim was 11 years old.

Perry Street Shooting: What Police Told the Vigil

Revell spoke to the congregation before closing his time at the podium with a prayer of his own. He gave new details about the investigation and the condition of the victims, telling the crowd that all 11 people injured by gunfire were still recovering, with five released from hospital and six still in hospital, according to Fox 49's report on the vigil.

Revell said a series of fights broke out on a street packed with homecoming crowds. A fight broke out among young people just outside the stadium on Perry Street, then broke up, then another fight followed shortly after, and then another. Within two minutes, he said, a gun was brought into the scene, handed from one young person to another, and a number of shots were fired.

A 15-year-old suspect is in custody, according to reports on the vigil, and community leaders said their focus was on supporting victims and looking ahead. The investigation is still going on, Revell said, and police are still following up leads from the community. Anyone with information has been asked to contact Crime Solvers.

Tabernacle Missionary Baptist Church Vigil: Prayers and Song

Walker led the crowd in prayer and song at the church on 615 Tuskegee Street. He told the congregation that he had sat by King's bedside in hospital and prayed over her and her healing, and that she had signalled that she heard him as he prayed in her hospital room.

Words can't explain the tragedy or why. We do know one thing, that God's still here. That's our reason here tonight.

Dr. Timothy Beard, the interim president of Florida A&M University, then stood at the altar and led the room in prayer. “Hear the prayers, we can speak and understand the pain which we have in the words,” Beard said, according to the Tallahassee Democrat. “We lift before you every family whose life has been changed by this tragedy.”

People bowed their heads and held hands as the prayers were said, in the hope of touching the lives of everyone involved. Several other pastors stepped up to the altar, each with a personal prayer for a better future for a capital city living, in the words of the Tallahassee Democrat report, in an epidemic of gun violence.

Revell closed with his own prayer for the city he is charged with keeping safe.

“We see your comfort, Lord. Your peace, your presence, Lord. Our community has experienced something terrible, painful, frightening,” he said. “We do recognize the impact that reaches far beyond the physical wound.”

Tallahassee Shooting Victims: Healing Beyond Physical Wounds

Revell thanked the Lord for each first responder and medical professional who helped the community in its time of need. Then he prayed for the wounds that cannot be seen, naming fear, anxiety, sleepless nights and painful memories that remain long after physical injuries have healed.

“But Lord, we also ask you to heal the wounds that can't be seen,” he said. “Hold this community together, Lord. Heal the wounded, comfort the grieving, protect our children Lord and lead us to a better tomorrow.”

Readers following how churches respond when violence hits their own streets can see related coverage in the West Bengal Christian families allegedly attacked and forced into rituals, in the report of 7,500 Christians killed across Africa in 2026, in the report that Russia destroyed 737 churches in Ukraine while faith keeps growing, and in the church that opened again in northern England after 15 years closed.

For now, five victims are out of hospital and six are still in, a teenager is fighting to recover from a wound to the back of the head, and a church on Tuskegee Street has done the first thing it knows how to do. It opened its doors, held hands, and prayed out loud for a city that is still asking why.

Will the next homecoming weekend pass without another Perry Street, and will the prayers said on Wednesday night hold when the hospital visits end and the cameras leave? The families will find out in the slow weeks ahead, when healing is measured not in headlines but in hospital corridors, in sleep that finally comes, and in a 17-year-old girl's next steps.

But the most surprising part of this story is yet to come — keep reading.