Shortly before Evette Clint got caught in gunfire — her young life cut short by being in the wrong place at the wrong time — she visited the Crown Center Under the Sea Adventure Exhibit with her 3-year-old daughter, sisters, mom and nieces and nephews.
Clint, 21, was the third of four close sisters and part of a tight-knit family that looked out for each other. Like her sisters, Clint’s father wasn’t a big part of her life, and through adulthood the bond she shared with her mother and sisters in childhood stayed strong.
She was always eager to help her siblings, Amari, Rickayle and Ebony, and quick to offer to pick her nieces and nephews up, her mother, Marvette Griddine, said.
She walked at Swope Park with her family and was working on losing weight, experimenting with recipes and different ways to flavor water.
She brought the family together on family holidays, planning the menu and making sure everyone contributed.
“I always said we are all that we have,” Griddine said about her close relationship with her daughters. “Evette did a lot for the family. She did her part. ... She was the backbone and the support of me and of her sisters. And they always were together.”
Clint was pronounced dead May 10, three days after she was found in the driver’s seat of a car with a gunshot wound at Swope Park. Griddine said her daughter was at the park for a barbecue and was going to meet her later to pick up her daughter.
Gunfire broke out in the area and Clint was shot in her car as she tried to leave the park. Police are still looking for the suspects. Family members are raising money for her funeral services.
Tina Rambo-Faulkner first met Clint when Clint was a preteen at Genesis school. Her big personality endeared itself to Rambo-Faulkner, and the director of counseling at the time remained close to the family after Clint graduated and continued to provide support to Clint.
Rambo-Faulkner said Clint saw her sisters and mother as an important support system, and though she had her own personal struggles, her personality was bright, friendly and humorous. She loved to do make-up and experiment with hair.
They often went out for Chinese when they met during her young adult years.
“She was hilarious, a comedian in her own right,” Rambo-Faulkner said. “She was definitely a no-nonsense kind of person.”
As an adult, Clint stayed in touch, sending Rambo-Faulkner pictures of her daughter on Facebook.
It wasn’t just her daughter that seemed to be propelling Clint into young womanhood before she died, Griddine said. Clint had always been vivacious and energetic, someone who could grab all the attention in the room.
But she had started to show a new maturity and a confidence in herself. She began volunteering at the Swope Parkway Church of Christ last October.
She’d give people rides who needed them or share food with people who were hungry.
She doted on her daughter, making sure the 3-year-old always looked clean and presentable. Mother and daughter had deeper conversations about motherhood, Griddine said.
“We could see the change,” Griddine said. “She had always been a good mother. She became a beautiful young woman.”
Katy Bergen: 816-234-4120, @KatyBergen