Grief, politics and the loss of a Yorktown student

Dear Editor,

Again?

Another life taken from our extended community.

Sheridan Gorman, an 18-year-old freshman at Loyola University Chicago from Yorktown, was doing something entirely normal, walking with friends near campus, when her life was suddenly and violently taken by a criminal in the country here illegally.

As a current college student from this area, that reality is impossible to ignore. What happened to Sheridan is not distant, it is familiar. It is the same routines, the same sense of independence, the same expectation that we can go about our lives safely.

Her family described her as kind, vibrant, and someone who made others feel seen and valued. That is how she should be remembered.

While other town officials in our community gathered for “No Kings” rallies on March 28, and wrote letters recently protesting ICE, it was meaningful to see through news reports and local coverage, a community vigil in Yorktown at Jack DeVito Field, where hundreds from Northern Westchester came together to honor Sheridan’s life. That quiet act of coming together, standing beside her family, and supporting one another spoke louder than any political message ever could.

Because in moments like this, it should not be about slogans.

It should be about a name. A life. A family. A community forever changed.

The vigil in Yorktown reminded us of something important, that before anything else, we must first come together as a community, recognize the life that was lost from our own community, and stand with those who now carry unimaginable grief.

Sheridan was not an idea. She was not a talking point. She was one of us — a student, a young adult, someone at the beginning of her life.

Public safety is not abstract. It is a basic government responsibility.

That is where our focus belongs.

Sheridan Gorman should be remembered not for how she died, but for how she lived, and for the community that came together to honor her.

-Andea Sarno, Vails Grove