In cases where a spouse feels they must leave a relationship but that their departure would put them in danger, Xay Yang urges them to request a police escort or to contact Transforming Generations for advice. David Yang said his sister planned to leave Fue on the Friday morning she was killed.

Xay Yang said she wished her organization could have helped Jennifer before she was murdered.

Executive director Xay Yang said the group often works with women fleeing violent spouses in Minnesota and sometime other states. One group in attendance was Transforming Generations, a Twin Cities nonprofit created in 2016 that works to reduce gender-based violence within the Hmong community. 'I don't want any family to go through this and lose a sister too.' 'We're trying to make those changes so our kids, and especially female kids, have equality and somewhat equal rights to be able to leave a relationship and not feel threatened,' David Yang said. The service was unconventional, with several domestic violence awareness groups invited to speak and advocate for victims to seek help if they need it. Several hundred people attended the May 7 funeral.

'To this day, we haven't received one piece of paper, not her purse, nothing of hers,' he said. Her club football jersey was displayed at the funeral, but later had to be returned to her in-laws, David Yang said. Still, aspects of Hmong culture have restricted the Yang family, including not being able to retrieve Jennifer's personal documents or belongings. Transforming Generations, which works to works to reduce gender-based violence and provides other services in the Twin Cities, speaks at the funeral in early May for Jennifer Yang. 'Our sister didn't kill their son, so if they didn't want to negotiate, we would fundraise our own money for the funeral.' 'We said, 'No, we're going to do this ourselves,'' David Yang said. When the husband's family refused to budge on certain details, such as whether there would be a closed casket, Jennifer's family bucked tradition and declared that they would plan her funeral. In Hmong culture, the husband's family typically has control of the wife's funeral. The day after her death, her brother, David Yang, said he and the rest of her family had a tense discussion with Her's family about the specifics of his sister's funeral. Police say her husband Fue Her, 40, shot her and then turned the gun on himself. Yang, 36, was found dead March 10 in her home in Andover. Now, her siblings are trying to raise awareness about domestic violence, in defiance of what they say are certain patriarchal traditions in the Hmong community. The day after Jennifer Yang was killed by her husband in what authorities called a murder-suicide, her family had to fight to gain custody of her body and for a say in how her funeral would be held.

A woman makes a plan