Jacquelyn Smith To Be Memorialized In Churchville

CHURCHVILLE, MD — Jacquelyn Smith, 54, of Aberdeen, will be memorialized on Friday, Dec. 7. She was killed on Saturday, Dec. 1, giving to a panhandler in Baltimore City.

The memorial will take place at Helping Hands Ministries in Churchville.

Smith was in Baltimore with her husband after a family event when she saw a panhandler holding what looked like a baby and a sign that said: "Please help me feed my baby."

After she rolled down her window in the 1000 block of Valley Street in east Baltimore, police said a man approached the vehicle appearing to thank Smith and instead reached inside and tried to grab her wallet.

They struggled, and the man stabbed Smith in the torso with a knife, police allege. She died at the hospital.

Smith, an electrical engineer at Aberdeen Proving Ground, was a hard worker known for having a "heart of gold," friends told WJZ.

Her mother described her as "determined," saying Smith graduated from North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University and became an engineer, working for a Navy research center in Newport, Rhode Island, before moving on to the military installation in Maryland, the Providence Journal reported.

She loved poetry, leaves behind two adult sons and was "the best mother there ever was," her mother, Anna Trisvane, 88, told the CBS affiliate in Providence.

At the time of the stabbing — around 12:30 a.m. on Saturday, Dec. 1 — police she said was a passenger in the car in the 1000 block of Valley Street leaving a family gathering in Baltimore. She had been with her husband celebrating his daughter's birthday, according to The Baltimore Sun; the daughter, who had just turned 28 years old, lived on Valley Street, the newspaper reported.

Investigators are still working to identify the man and woman involved in her death.

A vigil was held for Smith on Thursday, Dec. 6, within blocks of the crime scene, outside Sweet Prospect Baptist Church in the 900 block of East Eager Street. Residents held candles and condemned the violent slaying of the good Samaritan at the event, according to Fox 45, which interviewed one resident who said: "That could have been my mother, my sister...for somebody to take her life because she's doing something decent, I felt nothing but anger."

At her church in Harford County, Smith was reportedly very involved in the ministry, such as holding classes for new members.

The memorial for Jacquelyn Smith will be at 6 p.m. on Friday, Dec. 7, at Helping Hands Ministries, 3237 Level Rd, Churchville.

There will also be a memorial for her in Providence, Rhode Island, where she is from, on Saturday, Dec. 15, according to the Providence Journal.

SEE ALSO:

• Harford Woman Killed Giving Money To Woman With 'Baby'
• Aberdeen Woman Fatally Stabbed Was Engineer At APG: Report
• Oprah On Homicide By Panhandler: 'This Story Struck My Heart'
• Panhandling Under Scrutiny After Baltimore Homicide

Image via Google street view.