Gladstone Michel and Ruth DeClasse said goodbye to their only son, Jerry DeClasse, for the last time Sunday afternoon.
DeClasse laid peacefully in his coffin, three blue, stained-glass angels etched behind him.
On Jan. 9, Jerry DeClasse was hit by a car on Northeast Waldo Road, according to Gainesville Police. On Jan. 16, he was taken off life support after receiving care from UF Health Shands Hospital following the hit-and-run accident. He was 20.
His funeral was held in the DeClasses’ native language of Haitian Creole at 1 p.m. Sunday in the Gainesville Seventh-day Adventist Church at 2115 NW 39th Ave.
Ruth DeClasse’s wails echoed throughout the wood-and-stone church. She repeated Jerry’s name over and over before switching to Haitian-Creole hymns.
“I love Jerry, my son,” Ruth DeClasse said through her sobs.
A sea of black and white clothing filled the pews as family and friends shuffled in with bowed heads.
A clarinet-and-piano duo broke the heavy silence.
Dressed in white, Ruth DeClasse made her way to the lectern with her husband, who supported her by the waist, and her daughter Rudjelle, who held her arms.
She spoke in Creole, evoking painful wails and shouts of agreement from the crowd before she started singing. Tears streamed down her face, but she never faltered, looking out and bellowing a song she dedicated to her son.
When she finished, she fell into her husband’s arms, and he carried her off the stage.
Rudjelle DeClasse took the microphone and pulled it close. She said her brother was everything to her; he supported her when she needed it.
“The last time I saw him, he sat me down and he told me how much he believed in me and how much potential I had,” she said.
His life was also celebrated on campus Monday in the Chandler Auditorium of the Harn Museum of Art with Innovation Academy students and immediate family members.
UF President Kent Fuchs attended to give his condolences to DeClasse’s family.
“We cherish our students here at the University of Florida,” Fuchs said. “We know that each student adds something special and unique and wonderful to our university and community.”
Innovation Academy Director Jeff Citty said DeClasse would have been in the first class of Innovation Academy graduates, earning an IA minor.
DeClasse finished four of the six classes for the IA minor, and Citty awarded his family the university’s first IA medal.
DeClasse’s memorial ended with a speech by one of his close friends, 20-year-old David Nassau.
“I’m a better person for knowing Jerry,” the UF business and marketing junior said.
As the ceremony came to a close and crying friends and family filed out, two flutes softly hummed “Amazing Grace.”
[A version of this story ran on page 1 on 2/3/2015 under the headline “UF student Jerry DeClasse remembered with campus memorial"]
From left: Hammaad Saber, a 21-year-old UF industrial systems engineering junior, Jerry DeClasse and Ben Vance, a 21-year-old UF industrial systems engineering junior, pose for a picture.
Hammad Saber, a 21-year-old UF industrial systems engineering junior, David Nassau, a 20-year-old UF business and marketing junior, Jerry DeClasse and Natalia Tanayo, a 22-year-old UF public relations junior, interact with the audience at a Center for Leadership and Service Panel.
