Ronnie Lillard of Fort Myers reconciles death of friend, mentor George Floyd

Ronnie Lillard did not at first recognize George Floyd upon seeing the footage of him being kneeled on his neck by a Minneapolis Police Department officer.

Lillard, a 2007 Lehigh Senior High School graduate and Fort Myers native, said he thought it was just another black man suffering from the power of the police. And then Lillard looked at his Instagram feed and saw his friends from the third ward of Houston, Texas, posting “Rest in Peace George Floyd.”

To Lillard, this wasn’t just another black man. This was Lillard’s friend and mentor, a man who helped send Lillard on a trajectory of trying to make a difference in the lives of troubled youth.

“When I realized it was him, tears just started flowing down my face,” said Lillard, 31 and the father of five, including two sets of twins. “I was broken. I just started crying. I couldn’t hold my emotions back.”

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In the three weeks since Floyd was killed May 25, Lillard has continued to reconcile his own identity as the son of a black woman who gave birth to him at age 16 and a white man who raised him, bouncing around in various, predominately low-income black neighborhoods in Lee County, which had one of the last school districts in the nation to desegregate and was considered in the mid-1990s by a University of Michigan study to be the most segregated city in the country.

Lillard, also a Christian rap artist, chose the name “Reconcile” for his rap career.

Over the past three weeks, Lillard has organized prayer walks in Miami, where he now lives following eight years in Houston. He has met with the mayor of Miami. He has planned another civil rights march for Sunday in Miami. He has done interviews with the Associated Press, the New York Times, NPR, the Houston Chronicle and Christianity Today, sharing his stories and memories of Floyd.

Lillard is the director of juvenile justice for Youth for Christ, a non-profit organization founded by the late Rev. Billy Graham.

The marches for social justice and equality are recent additions to what has been Lillard’s life’s work.

“We work at every correctional facility in the South Florida area and Dade County,” said Lillard, who tripled majored in religious studies, sociology and philosophy at Rice while playing football there following one year at the Air Force Academy. “We provide services for the department of justice. If there’s a kid who comes on the news, and he has committed a large crime, like a murder, chances are I’m going to see him that night.

“I’ve worked with so many kids. I’ve been doing this type of work since I was a sophomore in college. I grew up in a trailer park and in the projects, never having any money. I realized this was my calling. It gave me a heart for me to come back to communities and make a difference.”

Floyd served as a tremendous influence for Lillard’s career, he said, and this influence occurred years before his killing. They first met in 2013, after Floyd had been released from prison. They crossed paths through a church ministry in Houston’s third ward.

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Lillard gravitated to the third ward, because it reminded him of the neighborhoods east of downtown Fort Myers, referred to as Dunbar.

Lillard frequented the Dunbar community and played youth football for the Fort Myers Rebels, which became the Fort Myers Firecats.

“As I’m going to school at Rice, I start hearing about this Bible study at this church,” Lillard said. “I’m meeting with the pastor. Me and him clicked. And so, he becomes a mentor to me. All these kids from these different universities, we’re living in the third ward. We’re going to school. We had Houston Cougar students, Rice University students and Texas Southern students.

“Floyd was released from prison in 2013 in January. I had formed relationships out there. We would put on concerts. We’d take groceries to elderly people. We’d play basketball with residents. Sharing the gospel. Praying for people. When George was released, he came back home, and he knew everybody out there. His name was like gold out there.”

Floyd, who stood 6-foot-7, played basketball at South Florida Community College in Avon Park. He rapped, too.

“It’s amazing what he was doing in the community,” Lillard said of Floyd. “His life changed. My life changed. Those were our conversations.”

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Lillard and other friends called Floyd the “O.G.,” short for “old guard.” The expression has a deeper meaning on the streets of low-income neighborhoods like in the third ward or Dunbar, Lillard said.

“The gangsters in the streets aren’t old guys,” Lillard said. “They’re 19, 20 years old. What ‘O.G.’ means now is somebody who survived the neighborhood. And he was a person of peace. That’s what that means. He’s a person who was encouraging of other people. He showed me I could make it, too. He gave me encouragement and wisdom. That’s who he was in the neighborhood. He became a person who lived by Christian colloquialisms. ‘Praise God. Hey guys, you gotta get off these streets. Hey man, you need to be a voice for the voiceless. Don’t waste your voice.’ He would tell people that. He’s an embodiment of being a voice for the voiceless.”

Ron Lillard, Ronnie Lillard’s father, now lives in Clearwater, where he helps homeless military veterans find homes. He said he’s proud of the path his son has taken.

“I’ve watched him with his ministries,” the father said. “I was aware of what he was doing, performing as a Christian artist. He gives testimonials. He does more than just perform concerts. It’s people coming to the church. It’s people getting saved. It’s amazing. What’s amazing to me, is him making a difference in young men’s lives. He follows the line. It’s always about helping people. He’s doing his own thing.”

That his son is biracial also gives him a perspective most do not have, the father said.

Ronnie Lillard said many white people from Fort Myers could not understand the black youth’s anger at police while also being victims and perpetrators of black-on-black crime. He tried to explain.

“The difference is we are not afraid of each other,” Lillard said. “But we are afraid of the police. And that fear shouldn’t be there. They are supposed to protect us.

“There were numerous times when I got arrested on campus just for being black. Being a black athlete on campus. They’d intimidate me. There was a time I was walking home, and someone called the police on me. I had the police interrogating me.  There was a time I got arrested for showering in the dorm, because somebody thought I wasn’t a student there.

“That was a reason why I didn’t feel comfort at Rice. That was why I spent most of my time in the third ward, with people that reminded me of Dunbar and Fort Myers. I found a beautiful ministry there.”

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There’s a photograph of Floyd, holding up a Bible while with friends from Houston. It has been circulating on social media since Floyd's death. Lillard said he was standing right behind the person who took the picture. He said after all that has happened, he wished he could have been in the photograph.

“The movement is for civil rights right now, and it’s being hijacked by something else,” Lillard said. “It’s sad, with all the momentum. I would hate for his life to be in vain. It seems like it’s being hijacked into another direction. It’s starting to have nothing to do with civil rights, and it’s starting to get into politics.

“I think the trajectory of what’s going to happen is that people are going to get burned out. Hopefully, people will hear more about George’s life, what type of person he was and learn more about African-American issues. We need a national conversation about these things. We need accountability for our police.  We need to reform our government housing situation. We need to create opportunities to create wealth in African American communities. We need a reform of our school districts to make sure education is a true developer.”

Connect with this reporter: David Dorsey (Facebook), @DavidADorsey (Twitter).