Family mourns loss, celebrates Houma 14-year-old’s short life

At the former Shriner’s Hall on Moffet Road near the Houma air base, they used all 425 chairs Saturday morning, and the people who still came had to stand all the way back through a rear hallway.

They were there to mourn an Ellender Memorial High freshman who would be 14 forever, who lay beneath outstretched white netting in a casket of white, floral arrangements, some in the shape of footballs, on either side. He wore a Carolina Panthers jersey, a tribute from an uncle because it was his favorite team.

Cameron Tillman was felled by police bullets the evening of Sept. 23 because he allegedly had a realistic-looking BB gun in his hand when he opened the door of an abandoned house in Village East. It is a house that teens and young adults, according to friends and relatives of its owner, used as a clubhouse.

“We will get justice,” said Wyteika Tillman, the teen’s mother, who spoke after several mourners, including Ellender assistant coach Albert Swan, praised her son’s promise for the future and athletic ability.

The mood was more intimate the night before, at the home of Lionel and Beverly Shephard, Cameron’s maternal grandparents, where Wyteika thumbed through an album of photos, a plastic-bound repository of the brief life her son had lived since his birth on a cold January day in the year 2000.

Outside the house, other relatives gathered to share stories, including Cameron’s father, Morrell Turner, and several uncles.

“He was a greedy child,” Wyteika said, explaining how he never seemed to have enough milk even as a tiny, tiny baby.

He loved to eat, and on the last night of his life, Wyteika said, she was cooking green onion sausages from Rouses. She had spoken with him earlier in the day, while working at her job as a hotel clerk in east Houma, and he said that’s what he wanted for dinner.

The sausages were almost done when a neighbor arrived at her home and breathlessly told her to come to Kirkglen Loop, that something terrible had happened.

Composing herself, Wyteika spoke of family trips to Galveston and how close Cameron was to his older brother, Andre, and then after turning a page in the over-stuffed album, she burst into sobs. His sonogram, the image that she first saw while the baby was inside of her, was there, and gave an unexpected mental jab, more than she could bear.

Although coaches vouched for Cameron’s athletic ability, his scholastic performance gave equal pride to family members.

He excelled at mathematics, and had spoken of becoming an engineer.

But most of all, he was remembered as a boy who loved being a boy, who while speaking of the future reveled in the luxuries of childhood.

Wherever he was, at his mom’s house nearby or at his grandparents’ home, Cameron would watch “SpongeBob SquarePants” cartoons whenever he could, laughing as he did with little cousins, with whom he enjoyed spending time. “Pink Panther” cartoons were another favorite.

“This was a good kid,” said his grieving grandfather, Lionel Shephard, with whom he was extremely close.

“All day long, ‘Maw-maw, where’s Paw-paw?’”

“I called him ‘Andy and Opie’ she said, explaining that when he would come to her house he would repeatedly ask “where’s Paw-Paw,” a reference to her husband. It reminded her of how Opie would call for his father on “The Andy Griffith Show.”

He was his grandmother’s computer repair and navigation person, aiding her whenever she had problems, treating her with dignity and patience.

“He would make you laugh,” she said, recalling the time he posed with one of her picture hats.

The family has been particularly distressed by the suggestion that he was engaged in any illegal activity. He and other youngsters, they noted, often gathered in the house where he was killed.

They don’t understand why anyone would have called the police, although the call included a reference to guns – later determined to be pellet pistols.

“Cameron would never have had a real gun,” one cousin said.

Beverly Shephard remembers most dearly the nights her grandson would spend time with her in the kitchen.

“He liked to cook tilapia,” she said, noting that he enjoyed watching cooking shows on television. “Cam loved to cook, because Cam loved to eat. He cooked a perfect tilapia. He would tell me Maw-Maw, I want to watch you cook so I can learn.

Cameron was especially fond of cats that wandered near the house, playing with them and petting them, always gently and lovingly, family members said.

After the funeral in east Houma, mourners gathered at Southdown Cemetery for a final goodbye, many wearing “Justice for Cam” T-shirts. The pallbearers, including Andre Tillman, wore white, and left their white gloves on the casket when they were dismissed from their service.

Among them was Kawane Stewart, who had attended Oaklawn Junior High with Cameron, and had begun freshman studies this year with him at Ellender.

“He was my best friend,” she said. “He never lied to me.”

Cameron Tillman