The Washington PostDemocracy Dies in Darkness

They were soul mates who wanted to have a baby. Then gun violence altered their future.

‘How do I change this tragedy to be a celebration of life?’

By
May 4, 2018 at 10:02 a.m. EDT

Adapted from a story by The Washington Post’s Katie Zezima.

Trenelle and Carey Gabay were soul mates. They married in 2012, and they desperately wanted to have a baby. But in 2015, when the couple was trying to get pregnant, Carey got caught in the crossfire of a gang shootout in Brooklyn during a predawn celebration at the West Indian American Day Carnival.

On his fourth day in a coma, Trenelle asked doctors if they could harvest Carey’s sperm. They did. After nine days in a coma, Carey died. His alleged assailants are now on trial.

When Trenelle googled her husband about six months after he was killed, she saw a photo of him next to a headline that read, “Hopeless Nation.” She was so upset that she ran to the bathroom and vomited. Her husband, she said, was anything but hopeless.

Now, Trenelle wants to her ensure her husband’s death isn’t forgotten, so she tells his story.

The son of Jamaican immigrants, Carey was raised in a New York housing project and graduated from Harvard University and Harvard Law School. He worked as a lawyer for New York Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo (D), and he helped craft a New York gun-control law.

Seeking a way to cope, and to honor her husband, Trenelle is fulfilling their shared dream: She is pregnant with Carey’s child.

“How do I change this tragedy to be a celebration of life?” she asked.

“I would like to leave this world knowing all future generations are safe, even more now that I have a son on the way,” she said.

The baby boy is due in July. She has already picked out a name: Carey Gabay.