An 18-year-old girl dreaming of becoming a nurse, a father of two and a former Princeton football star suffered fatal injuries when the driver of a white pickup truck sped down Bourbon Street, packed with holiday revelers early Wednesday morning.
Officials have not yet released the names of the 15 people killed in the New Orleans New Year’s Day truck attack, but their families and friends have started sharing their stories. New Orleans Coroner Dr. Dwight McKenna said in a statement late Wednesday that the names of the dead would be released once autopsies were complete and next of kin were informed. About 30 people were injured.
Nikyra Dedeaux
Zion Parsons of Gulfport, Mississippi, had been celebrating New Year’s Eve during his first night on Bourbon Street when a vehicle appeared and plowed into his friend, 18-year-old Nikyra Dedeaux, who he said had dreamed of becoming a nurse.
“A truck hit the corner and comes barreling through, throwing people like in a movie scene, throwing people into the air,” Parsons, 18, told The Associated Press. “It hit her and flung her like at least 30 feet, and I was just lucky to be alive.”
As the crowd scattered in the chaos, he ran through a gruesome aftermath of bleeding and maimed victims, hearing gunshots and explosive sounds.
“Bodies, bodies all up and down the street, everybody screaming and hollering,” Parsons said. “People crying on the floor, like brain matter all over the ground. It was just insane, like the closest thing to a war zone that I’ve ever seen.”
Dedeaux was a responsible daughter — shorter than all her siblings but the one who helped take care of everyone, Parsons said. Dedeaux had a job at a hospital and was set to start college and begin working toward her goal of becoming a registered nurse.
“She had her mind set — she didn’t have everything figured out, but she had the plan laid down,” Parsons said.
Reggie Hunter
Reggie Hunter, a 37-year-old father of two from Baton Rouge, had just left work and headed to celebrate New Year’s with a cousin when the attack happened, another cousin, Shirell Jackson, told Nola.com.
Hunter was killed and his cousin was injured, Jackson said.
Tiger Bech
A former high school and college football player from Louisiana was among those who died in the attack at New Orleans’ French Quarter, according to an education official.
Tiger Bech, 28, died late Wednesday morning at a New Orleans hospital, according to local media outlets citing Kim Broussard, the athletic director at St. Thomas More Catholic High School in Lafayette. Bech attended the high school, where he played wide receiver, quarterback, punt returner and defensive back, NOLA.com reported.
Bech’s LinkedIn profile said he had played football at Princeton University before graduating in 2021. Most recently he was working as an investment trader at a New York brokerage firm.
Princeton football coach Bob Surace said Wednesday that he had been texting with Bech’s father, sharing memories of the player, who was a kick returner and receiver from 2017 to 2019.
“He might be the first Tiger to ever play for us, and that nickname kind of described him as a competitor,” Surace told ESPN. The school’s teams are also called the Tigers. “He was somebody that somehow, like in the key moments, just excelled and was full of energy, full of life.”
Bech had been working at Seaport Global, where company spokesperson Lisa Lieberman could not confirm his death. But she told The Associated Press that “he was extremely well regarded by everybody who knew him.”
