DATE: Tuesday, June 17, 1997                TAG: 9706170294

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY ANGELITA PLEMMER, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: PORTSMOUTH                        LENGTH:   78 lines

``EBONI IS FULL OF LIFE'' MOURNERS GATHER IN PORTSMOUTH TO FIND SPIRITUAL COMFORT AT THE FUNERAL FOR A 13-YEAR-OLD SHOOTING VICTIM.

More than 1,000 people gathered Monday afternoon at Ebenezer Baptist Church to say farewell to Eboni Johnson, a 13-year-old girl many of them had never met.

Eboni's family had been overwhelmed by support from across Hampton Roads after the honor-roll student was shot to death at her front door last week.

Daphlyn Johnson White, Eboni's mother, said that support helped sustain her through the ordeal. And when her daughter's white-and-gold-flecked casket was lowered into the ground Monday afternoon, White smiled.

Purple was Eboni's favorite color. Her mother wore a regal purple-and-gold African pantsuit and headwrap to the service. At the gravesite, her eyes scanned countless faces as more than 300 mourners crowded beneath a small tent at Greenlawn Cemetery in Chesapeake.

White and other family members wore purple ribbons pinned to their clothing. Floral arrangements that included purple dyed carnations and daisies marked Eboni's final resting place.

Family members, friends, teachers, former classmates, city officials, police officers and ministers of various faiths gathered to mourn Eboni and to take a stand against the violence that abruptly ended her life.

A student at Hunt-Mapp Middle School, she was shot in the face and chest June 8 after someone fired twice through the front door of her Brighton area home as she answered the door.She died a day later.

``Eboni's life in its ending started a new life for her family and friends,'' said her uncle, Lester Johnson, standing several yards away from her gravesite. ``The Johnson family wishes to thank everyone for the love and graciousness they have extended to us.''

Earlier, the church on Effingham Street in downtown Portsmouth was crowded with people who had come to hear her short life eulogized and to find spiritual comfort.

``She was a young woman with courage,'' Portsmouth Mayor James Holley said at her funeral. ``And coupled with that was a deep and abiding faith.''

Hunt-Mapp Principal Carroll Bailey Jr. decried the ``lack of understanding

Others who spoke during the hourlong service urged mourners to take a stand against violence and become more active in their communities.

``Our children are valuable,'' said Minister Shelton X, a spokesman for the Nation of Islam. ``That's our future - we can't sit back and cast them away.''

Hours before Eboni was shot, she had neatly packed a box of keepsakes - filled with honor-roll ribbons, photographs of herself and friends, dried roses, Valentine's Day candy and other personal treasures - that she had placed for safekeeping under her grandmother's bed.

One week after the shooting, police have made no arrests and released few details about the incident, except that the suspect or suspects may have fled on a motorcycle.

While police are still looking for clues, family members have received an outpouring of financial, spiritual and emotional support. A North Carolina company donated Eboni's casket. The owner of a local cleaners handwashed, pressed and hand-delivered Eboni's funeral outfit - a purple pantsuit - for free. The family has also received numerous cards, calls and visits from residents all over Hampton Roads.

In a final tribute to Eboni, her aunt, Diana Johnson Blackwell, wrote in the funeral program:

``Eboni is full of life. She was constantly moving and doing something. With each thing she did, there was a smile on her face. . . . Eboni was on the launch pad of her short life. She was preparing to sprout wings of purple and fly.'' ILLUSTRATION: Color photo

VICKI CRONIS/The Virginian-Pilot

Daphlyn Johnson White, Eboni's mother, reaches out through a

limousine window to accept a consoling handshake after the funeral

service.

Photo

Eboni Johnson's funeral drew many people who never knew the popular

girl. KEYWORDS: MURDER SHOOTING FUNERAL

Send Suggestions or Comments to webmaster@scholar.lib.vt.edu