Family of White Hall student shot and died prior to graduation speaks out

White Hall, Arkansas – Benjamen Redix was shot and died on May 18, the night before he was to graduate from White Hall High School, leaving his family with an unending nightmare.

Ben’s mother, Shaneisha Robinson, recalled that every day, her son would express his desire to please her.

Robinson stated that she feels both proud and even more heartbroken as she dug through a box of Ben’s football and track accolades.

“I’m just trying to go minute by minute,” she said as the week anniversary of her son’s death approaches.

Jamari Douglas, 17, shot and killed Redix in North Little Rock on May 18 in what the police are calling an accident.

“I know he is going to a better place, so I am content with it,” Ben’s father Ben Redix Sr. said.

The night before he was killed, Redix, according to his family, had attended Star City High School’s graduation. He would have received his diploma the next day.

“It was a very sad occasion not seeing him get his own diploma,” Redix Sr. said.

Robinson did it in his honor, though.

“I thought I was going to pass out sitting there but I could just hear Benjamen saying ‘Mama you’re a strong woman,’ so I did it for my son,” Robinson said.

Robinson claimed that she received a call the evening of the incident from a witness to Ben’s shooting. She reported not seeing her son at the scene, and nearly a week later, she hasn’t.

“I didn’t want to see him covered with the white sheet. I was just waiting until they dressed him for the funeral,” Robinson said.

The funeral for Redix will take place on Saturday at Pine Bluff’s New Saint Hurricane Baptist Church, according to the family.

Ben achieved his primary objective of pleasing his family by graduating, winning the state championship in track and field, and producing thrilling plays in football that earned him a scholarship to play for Southern Arkansas University.

“He went out a champion.”