By Scott Brinton
, two 2005 Kennedy High School graduates who were shot to death in Tempe, Ariz., earlier in the week.
At Schiffman's funeral at Gutterman's Memorial Chapel in Rockville Centre last Wednesday morning, mourners spilled into the lobby. At Kestenbaum's service at the I.J. Morris Funeral Home in Hempstead later that afternoon, a line of mourners stood on the sidewalk, unable to get in because the crowd was so large. The two 20-year-old women, who were described as best friends, were buried side by side at Montefiore Cemetery in West Babylon, with flowers covering their coffins.
Family members and friends came from throughout Bellmore-Merrick to pay tribute to the two young women. Others flew in from Tempe, where Kestenbaum was studying early-childhood education at Arizona State University, and from College Park, Md., where Schiffman was majoring in journalism at the University of Maryland.
At Schiffman's funeral, her father, Ronald, read a poem that his daughter wrote as a Kennedy senior. Titled "Simple Word," it spoke to the daily tragedies of the Iraq war.
In an interview, Nicole's mother, Cheryl, said her daughter was deeply concerned for the welfare of others. She especially loved her sister, Lindsey, 23, who spoke at her funeral.
After Nicole's death, Cheryl said, a friend of her daughter's came to her to say that he would always cherish how Nicole had counseled him after he lost his father in the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Nicole "touched so many people," her mother said. "There were hundreds and hundreds of kids in my home" to sit shiva.
Cheryl said she wonders "how something like this can happen -- that troubled teens who come reaching out are ignored." She was referring to 22-year-old Joshua Mendel, who killed her daughter, according to police. In the weeks before the shooting, Mendel had called Tempe police, saying that he wanted to be taken to a rehabilitation center to be treated for alcohol abuse. He never made it to a center, authorities said. The 911 operator had asked whether he had any guns in his house. He said no.
As it turned out, Mendel had two 9 mm semiautomatic handguns, a Smith & Wesson and a Ruger, which he had reportedly owned since he was a child growing up in Iowa. Mendel had carried the guns across state lines from Illinois, where he lived before moving to Tempe. He was not required to register the guns in Arizona after his arrival there, police said.
Last week, Ronald Schiffman called on Sen. John McCain, a Republican from Arizona who is running for president, to speak out against the gun violence that killed his daughter and Kestenbaum.
Authorities said the two women were shot on Feb. 18 at around 4 a.m. in the parking lot of Kestenbaum's apartment building. Shortly afterward, Mendel shot and killed himself. The two women were out celebrating Kestenbaum's 20th birthday before the shooting. Police said that Mendel was angry that his girlfriend had broken up with him a month earlier, after Kestenbaum, a friend of the young woman's, reportedly told her that she disapproved of him.
There was an air of sadness at Kennedy on Monday, when students returned from their winter break. The school day began with a moment of silence to honor Kestenbaum and Schiffman. Bellmore-Merrick Central High School District officials said that any students who needed counseling over the break were referred to Tempo Group, which provides crisis and substance-abuse counseling for the district. With school back in session, officials said, grieving students could meet with a team of psychologists, social workers and guidance counselors at Kennedy.
The Schiffmans are starting a scholarship fund in their daughter's name at Kennedy, with help from state Sen. Charles Fuschillo Jr. "It's at the very, very beginning stages," Cheryl Schiffman said. "It's going to be a writing contest. I will be reading the essays and awarding [the scholarship] to a child who we feel has a talent for writing." Cheryl noted how her daughter loved to write.
Until the scholarship fund is finalized, the Schiffmans asked that donations in their daughter's name be sent to Schneider Children's Hospital at North Shore to help teenagers with psychoses.
The Kestenbaums have established the Carol Kestenbaum Foundation, the proceeds of which will go to a yet unnamed children's charity, a family representative said. Donations can be sent to P.O. Box 1083, Bellmore, N.Y. 11710.
Ronald Schiffman read this poem at his daughter Nicole's funeral on Feb. 21. Nicole wrote about the war in Iraq while she was a Kennedy High School senior.
Simple Word
By Nicole Schiffman
Innocent lives to be lost
Love destroyed in only minutes
Fear entering everyone's lives
Children hearing the unimaginable
Having to bury the one they raised
Growing up without your daddy
The one you married no longer by your side
Sadness fills the bright blue skies
Young men having to give up their lives
Tears are brought to a different
person each day
Poverty rises as the economy falls
Not knowing what will happen next,
Will civilian lives be taken too?
Peace is gone, hatred here to stay
Is it necessary?
Hard questions to be answered
Can't there be a way around it?
Yet sometimes there is no choice
For is it better to let evil rule
a country or endanger yours?
So many questions to be answered
So many terrible possibilities
All form one simple word
WAR!
Comments about this story? SBrinton@liherald.com or (516) 569-4000 ext. 203.
