Nonprofit will hold rally to call for end to gun violence in Rochester

ROCHESTER, N.Y. (WHEC) — The nonprofit United and Healing through Hope of Monroe County is hosting a rally at 1:30 p.m. on Tuesday to demand an end to gun violence in Rochester.

The rally will take place at the Tops Supermarket on Upper Falls Boulevard. United and Healing through Hope of Monroe County has organized several previous anti-violence rallies.

The rally is in response to recent homicides, including the shooting of two RPD Officers. That shooting took the life of Officer Tony Mazurkiewicz.

A memorial for Mazurkiewicz at the Public Safety Building continues to grow. It has flowers and tributes from people who knew him and from people in this community who are simply fed up seeing shooting after shooting.

Mayor Malik Evans shares this community’s outrage.

"I am angry and upset because all too often, we are seeing over and over again blatant disregard for life,” he said. “Be it an old lady sitting on a porch, a 10-year-old girl braiding her grandmother’s hair and now an officer in the line of duty working to keep our city safe."

There have been 44 homicides in Rochester this year, two more than this time last year.