Faith at Work: A Justice and Advocacy series on how our faith informs and supports our work in the world.
Posted on by Steve Clark
Lisette Johnson
Gun violence is a public health issue.
It’s a pandemic that has to be addressed.
One of the leading advocates for reforming federal and state laws relating to firearms and domestic violence is St. Mark’s parishioner Lisette Johnson, a survivor of domestic violence who nearly died of gunshot wounds 14 years ago.
In the summer of 2009, Lisette informed her husband, Marshall, she wanted a divorce. He had been verbally abusing her for too long. She could not continue to live that way. When Lisette returned home from church on Sunday, Oct. 4, 2009, they met in the bedroom. She told him again she wanted a divorce.
Marshall retrieved a handgun. From a distance of about 4 feet, he shot her in the chest. Lisette ran of the room and yelled to her children – Natalie, then 12, and Graham, then 9 – to run out of the house and call 911. She escaped the house as he continued to shoot her. Marshall then shot himself. Natalie, who had entered the bedroom looking for Lisette, witnessed her father committing suicide.
Lisette was transported to VCU Medical Center Hospital and immediately taken to surgery. She was bleeding internally and surgeons had trouble finding the source of the bleeding.
“I lost 2.9 liters of blood,” she said. “They didn’t think I would make it through the night. The surgeon later told me they were praying a lot.”
By the grace of God and the surgeon’s skills, she survived. Two bullets remain in her body. One in her liver. One in the breast/chest wall.
After a long recovery period, she dedicated herself to advocating for changes in lax gun laws and to speaking on behalf of victims of domestic violence. Her first appearance on the national scene was in 2014 when then Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi invited Lisette to speak at a hearing in Washington. The topic was “Domestic Violence and Guns: An Epidemic for Women and Families.”
“I was also asked to take on an advocacy role to speak for gun violence prevention at the state level,” she said. “Gun violence is a public health issue. It’s a pandemic that has to be addressed.”
Over the years she has become friends with many other victims of intimate partner gun violence. “I have a 44-year-old friend in Texas whose husband shot her in the neck. She’s a quadriplegic and has been since she was 28, raising two toddlers to adults, alone.”
Lisette has been a volunteer at Richmond’s Safe Harbor Shelter and has worked at VCU’s Injury and Violence Prevention and the YWCA, which provides numerous services for domestic violence victims, including emergency shelter.
In a 2014 article in the Chesterfield Observer newspaper, Lisette was quoted as saying that for her tragedy to make any sense, she needed to help other people. “This was my survival technique.”
What can St. Mark’s parishioners do as the issue of gun violence relates to justice and advocacy?
“Vote! Vote! Vote!” she said. “For candidates who will make guns harder to access by those who are in crisis, including those with histories of domestic violence or substance abuse.”
Contacting lawmakers in Washington and Richmond also is important.
“Maybe we should have a training session at St. Mark’s on how to contact and talk to elected officials,” she said.