The long table is set for 13 people.
At Dayna Shaeffer's spot is a cup that has a tiny ceramic frog peeking out from the bottom. Her grandma gave her the cup when she was born.
A baby bottle and a favorite yellow buggy car sits at Jorge Gonzalez's spot.
Kathy Sheaffer's coffee mug, monogrammed with her name, sits by her plate.
Tucked under Maria Rodriguez's placemat is a protection-from-abuse order, written in her own hand.
"We were arguing and he had the machete in his hand," she wrote. "I didn't like the look in his eyes. I got scared."
A month later, Rodriguez was dead, at the hand of the boyfriend who had frightened and threatened her.
Rodriguez's chair is empty. So are the other chairs around the table just inside the front door of the Lancaster YMCA, 110 N. Lime St.
The chairs represent the "Empty Place at the Table," the name of the exhibit remembering the local homicide victims, all of whom lost their lives due to domestic violence.
The table exhibit is part of a week of exhibits and events commemorating National Crime Victims' Right Week. It will be open from 10 a.m. to noon and from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. through Thursday at the Y.
Carmen Potts supplied the place setting for her late daughter, Christina Colon. Police said a married Lancaster Township man killed Colon, 24, in July 2004, because she was pregnant with his child.
Colon's place at the table was empty at the birthday party of her 7-year-old stepsister, shortly after she disappeared, her mother said. Her place also has remained empty at other birthdays, holidays and family meals.
Colon loved to sing and laugh. She often stopped to visit her family. Potts always cooks a lot of food, and was happy to set a place for her daughter.
"I miss her tremendously," the Lancaster woman said. "When you lose a child, you never, ever forget."
The exhibit drives home losses such as Potts', as the table is not only set with the victim's own dishes and silverware, but also with the tangible reminders of the life that is gone.
At the spot for Mae Davis, 17, is her trophy from Solanco junior high volleyball. She was on the Black Team. Davis was shot by her boyfriend, who then turned the gun on himself in Little Britain Township.
At the spot for April Smith, 23, are pictures of her three sons. Smith was strangled to death with an electrical cord by her former boyfriend in Lititz.
At other spots are a stuffed panda bear, a candle, a baby quilt and a pair of sturdy little sandals.
The everyday belongings are a stark contrast to the deaths of the victims, who were shot, stabbed, hit with a hammer, suffocated, pushed out a third-story window and even set on fire.
"The things we do to the people we love ... and society just doesn't want to believe it," said Yvonne Russo-Devosa, an adult counselor with the YWCA Sexual Assault Prevention and Counseling Center, who was at the exhibit Monday.
Through Wednesday, the Lancaster County Courthouse will feature an information table and two exhibits: a homicide victims' memory quilt and the Silent Witness Exhibit, life-sized silhouettes representing local victims of domestic violence killings. The exhibits will be set up from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. in the lobby of the courthouse, 50 N. Duke St.
From 10 a.m. to noon Tuesday, victim services organizations will set up information tables at Penn Square. Also at the square will be the Clothesline Project, featuring T-shirts decorated by victims of sexual and physical violence.
Visitors to the YWCA also can view a Clothesline Project set up in its lobby.
The culmination of the week will be a candle-lighting ceremony to be held at 6:30 p.m. Thursday at the YWCA. Linda Crockett, a survivor of childhood abuse who now works for the Samaritan Counseling Center, will speak.
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