Aaron Hernandez during an NFL game against the Jacksonville Jaguars at EverBank Field on December 23, 2012 in Jacksonville, Florida.
Originally appeared on E! Online
Aaron Hernandez's fiancée is honoring the late NFL star's memory with a family tribute.
Shayanna Jenkins shared a throwback image of their daughter Avielle, 12, in church with a 2012 pic of the athlete smiling photoshopped in a corner, almost eight years after he died at age 27 of killed himself while serving a life sentence for first-degree murder.
"Celebrated our love for you privately, never forgotten always embraced," the athlete's fiancée captioned her March 22 Instagram photo, adding angel and dove emojis.
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In March 2024, Jenkins had shared a pic of Avielle wearing the same outfit—a white dress and veil—standing alongside her sister Giselle, 6, who is not Aaron's child.
Since Hernandez's death, the 35-year-old has occasionally shared tributes to the late football player, who played for the New England Patriots between 2010 and 2012. "You left this world, but not my heart," Jenkins wrote on Instagram in 2022, alongside several photos of the two a pic of her fiancé cuddling their then-baby girl in bed. "#AH81 #alwaysandforever."
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READ How Aaron Hernandez's Double Life Veered Fatally Out of Control
In April 2017, Hernandez was found dead in inside a cell in a Massachusetts maximum security prison, where he was serving a life sentence for the 2013 murder of a semi-professional football player Odin Lloyd, the boyfriend of Jenkins' sister, Shaneah Jenkins.
A year after Hernandez's death, Shayanna Jenkins spoke out about her grief in a tribute to her late partner.
"I remember getting a call saying you had passed," Shayanna Jenkins wrote in a tribute to her partner on Instagram in 2018. "Dropping the phone and crying uncontrollably I didn't know what to do. I wanted to get to you as fast as I knew how so you weren’t alone anymore."
She continued, "I was / still am so confused and wish I could ask you tons of questions - not just for me but for our daughter. I’ve suffered hurt, sadness and definitely anger BUT I've had this little girl to make my spirits higher."
Shayana Jenkins thanked Hernandez for "allowing me to share all of our experiences and create new memories" with Avielle. "Your legacy will live on," she wrote, "until we meet again."
Look back at Hernandez and Shayanna Jenkin's relationship...
