LEXINGTON, Ky. (LEX 18) — Finally, the family and friends of a teenage Lexington shooting victim hope they are taking a step toward closure.
Detectives have charged 19-year-old Malik Nelson, who already was serving time for another killing, in the death of Mikel Willis, also 19.
“We’d get tired of taking pictures,” said Willis’ friend Ronnie Woolfolk. “He couldn’t just take three and be done, he’d have to take a thousand.”
Willis was always the center of attention, he said.
“We’d call him pretty boy,” said Woolfolk. “He was ‘Instagram famous,’ get his 1,000 ‘likes’ and he would brag about it.”
It’s those boyhood memories that keep Woolfolk going. Woolfolk says he and Willis were friends since elementary school.
But that all ended Feb. 7 when Willis’ life was cut short in a split second of violence.
“There are days when you just feel like it can’t be, it shouldn’t have been, it can’t be,” said Woolfolk.
Many of those memories came flooding back Friday when Nelson was charged in connection with the murder.
“I can’t say that I was happy, just for the simple fact there is no win in the situation,” Woolfolk said. “His mother lost his son due to jail, and Mikel’s mom lost her son due to a grave.”
The arrest was not expected, Willis was caught up in an old memory when he heard the news.
“I was just thinking about something Mikel had done when we were in 5th grade and I just started smiling, and then everything comes out,” Woolfolk said.
