Family of murder victim fights crime through foundation work

Group seeks solutions to violence on the rise in local community

By Ralph Hardin

ralphhardin@gmail.com

You can read all about it in the pages of the Evening Times, scroll through the local social media pages or get the latest from the Memphis news channels, but you can’t deny that crime is a big issue in our community.

With shootings, robberies, drug busts and more happening all too often, one might ask, what can I do?

One local family has found an answer to that question, doing their part to combat community violence through a nonprofit organization launched in honor of a family member lost to that violence nearly a decade ago.

On Sept. 16, 2014, 24-yearold Quincy Suggs was shot and killed during an apparent robbery gone wrong. Three gang members were ultimately convicted of the crime and sentenced to life in prison, but that did little to fill the hole left by his death for family members.

Thus, the idea of a foundation in Suggs’s honor was launched with three words in mind: hope, help and healing.

In 2022, Quincy ‘s 3H foundation was founded in the memory of Quincy Suggs in the hopes that no one else would have to lose a loved one to violence.

From the group’s web site (quincys3Hfoundation.org): “Quincy moved with his parents from West Memphis, to metro Atlanta in grade school. Quincy attended Alabama A & M on a football scholarship after high school. Quincy grew up in the southern suburbs of Atlanta as a popular kid with friends who had attended school with him from elementary school through high school. Tragically, Quincy was killed by the rising influence of gangs in his area during an attempted robbery by members of one of the new gangs. Quincy was an independent thinker and insisted that he was ‘friends with everybody’ as not affiliated with any gangs. Quincy’s spirit of independence and his resistance to the pressure of group-think formed the basis of Quincy’s 3 H foundation.

He leaves behind a son Za’Quan Martin.”

Spearheaded by his aunt Tonya Johnson Hoard, who said her nephew’s death was “like a bad dream.”

Quincy’s 3H Foundation is looking for ways to further that goal of hope, help and healing, which included a recent appearance from Hoard at a community fourm in Bartlett, Tennessee aimed at addressing violence in the Mid-South.

“We challenge and empower everyone we encounter,” she says in the group’s mission statement.”Failure is not an option! We believe the sky is the limit to anything you could ever imagine or hope for. We believe there is help if you want to be helped. We believe time allows you to heal from anything. We promote citizenship, integrity, leadership, and that everybody is somebody.”

Why a nonprofit?

“I started this in memory of him to carry out his legacy and something positive,” she said. “A lot of people just need support.

That work comes in the form of mentorships, entrepreneurship training and other workshops and seminars aimed at not just confronting community violence but stopping it before it starts through awareness and programs to break the cycle thar often perpetuates in poor communities and high-crime neighborhoods.

In addition to the web site, which offers links to resources and a donation page, Suggs’s family also maintains a memorial page on Facebook in his name, the Quincy “PaperBoi Q” Suggs Memorial Page, filled with tributes from family and friends. For more information about how to support or join with Quincy’s 3H Foundation, visit quincys3Hfoundation.org