By Sarah Portlock and Derrick Bryson Taylor
The time had come for Diana Tate to speak at her grandson Jayden’s funeral. She rose from her seat on the aisle at St. Matthew’s Roman Catholic Church and walked past his small white coffin.
She climbed three steps and turned to face the congregation that had grown quiet in anticipation of what she would say.
A week had passed since her daughter and her companion had been arrested and charged with beating four-year-old Jayden Lenescar with their fists and a belt and leaving him in a bathtub to die of organ failure and cardiac arrest two days later, on Oct. 23.
Tate stood with her shoulders back, a stout woman in a flowing white skirt, a black jacket and white ribbon in her hair. She did not meet the eyes of those watching her. Instead she looked straight ahead and then to the coffin below her.
“I’m Jayden’s grandma,” she began. “This is a pain that has no medication for it.”
She closed her eyes and opened her arms wide in front of her and said, “I love Jayden and he loves me so much. I want to know why he’s not here with me. Why? Why?”
The ritual of mourning and burial had begun Friday night with a wake at the Robeson and Brown Funeral Home in Bedford-Stuyvesant. People had gathered outside the door and as they chatted they could hear the wailing coming from inside.
Jayden lay in an open casket. He wore jeans and Spiderman T-shirt. Nestled in the white satin in which he lay were his toys — a big teddy bear, a GI Joe. Photographs of Jayden rotated in the flat screen television above him — Jayden at a pool, at the beach, in a tuxedo with a bow tie, with his father, and, as an infant, being held by his mother.
The room was filling up. “One Sweet Day,” by Mariah Carey and Boyz II Men played in the background. Diana Tate sat in front of the casket, weeping. “I want Jayden back,” she said.
From time to time she rose and walked to the casket. She reached in to touch his folded hands. She shook her head and cried until people came to lead her back to her seat.
Her daughter, Myrna Chenphang, was being held at Rikers Island charged with second-degree murder. She had visited the funeral home earlier that day, escorted by a prison guard.
The guests took turns telling stories about Jayden; how he loved making believe he was Spiderman, leaping off the bed mimicking the sound of webs coming out of his finger tips.
Someone sang “Amazing Grace” and then the funeral director asked everyone who wished to view Jayden to line up. Some reached to touch him. Others paused to take a photograph.
The following morning perhaps 200 people gathered at St. Matthews on Eastern Parkway. It is a vast sanctuary filled with images and icons and illuminated by sunlight.
Father Andrew Struzzieri, accompanied by a deacon and two altar girls, walked down the center aisle to Jayden’s casket, which lay at the Baptismal fount. Father Andy, as he is known, sprinkled holy water on the casket before the pallbearers covered it with a white cloth and accompanied to the altar. The deacon handed the censer to Father Andy who made the sign of the cross over the altar and then over the casket.
“There is really no way I myself can console you,” he said. “Only God can.”
He continued. “Jayden is like Jesus. Jesus was innocent and died a terrible death. Jayden is innocent and died a terrible death.”
Readings followed, as did songs. A soprano sang “Ave Maria,” and as the music soared so too did the wailing from front of the room, where Jayden’s grandmothers sat. The sounds were so primordial, so filled with hurt and pain and suffering, that people looked at one another as if they did not know what to do.
The congregation joined in saying the Lord’s Prayer. And then the time had come for Diana Tate to speak.
“Jayden, I’m sorry,” she said. Her composure was ebbing. “I’m sorry I didn’t save you and I couldn’t protect you. Forgive me. Forgive me, Jayden. I wish I was here to save you. Oh, Jayden. You know how he was my love, my happiness. He made me so happy. He was almost my kid, and I miss him so much. I’m so sorry I couldn’t save you.”
An aunt of Jayden’s tried to lead her back to her seat. But Tate would not leave the casket. She rested an arm across it, as if in a hug. “I’m so sorry,” she said.
The pallbearers accompanied the casket of the church and to a waiting hearse that would carry Jayden to Pinelawn Cemetery on Long Island.
And on Monday morning, the Brooklyn District Attorney’s office presented its case against Diana Tate’s daughter to a grand jury.
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