‘That was part of our family tradition so it was taken away from us:’ Central Illinois family says Fourth of July holiday hasn’t been the same since mass shooting at Highland Park Parade

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. (WCIA) – Many people will be out Thursday celebrating the Fourth of July with fireworks and parades.

But One Central Illinois family says the holiday hasn’t looked the same for them after the Highland Park parade mass shooting two years ago.

“Lots of people say to us ‘What are you doing on the Fourth, or how are you celebrating or what are your plans’” Laura Bleill said.

Those questions bring up a lot of emotions for Bleill and her daughter Nessa.

“It’s hard for me to think about anything going forward,” Nessa said. “I wouldn’t want to be there for the parade, for any other parade.”

Laura grew up in the Highland Park community and has family there. The Fourth of July parade was something they looked forward to every year.

“That was part of our family tradition so it was taken away from us,” Laura said.

In 2022, the family watched fire trucks flashing their lights in celebration along the parade route. What they didn’t know was that there was a gunman with an assault style weapon on a rooftop in the building across from them.

“One of my daughters turned and said to me, ‘Well mom, if all the first responders are here, what happens if there’s an actual emergency,’ and about three minutes later, there was,” Laura said.

The gunman opened fire on the crowd below. Seven people were killed and dozens of others were hurt.

“I thought it was the military salute and then it kept going and people started running,” Nessa said. “We got down on the curb of the street and basically waited there until police told us we could get up and they told us to go hide.”

They went into an apartment vestibule not too far from where they were sitting. They waited there until police arrived and told them they could leave.

But they had another problem: they couldn’t get to their car because it was in the crime scene, so they called a friend to pick them up.

“We had left all of our chairs, we left …  pretty much everything there except our important things,” Nessa said.

Since then, the family hasn’t gone to Fourth of July parades. Instead, they travel when the holiday comes around.

“It’s really hard to go back there, especially when it’s around the Fourth of July, so we just take ourselves out of the equation and try to make happy memories around this time,” Nessa said.

After surviving the mass shooting, Nessa helped start a chapter of Students Demand Action at Champaign Central High School, the first to be started in the Champaign area.

The national organization has local chapters across the country made up of high school and college students fighting to end gun violence.

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