WOODLAND HILLS : Service to Remember Victim of Stray Bullet

Amy Margolis Silberman, killed by a bullet apparently fired into the air during a New Year’s Eve celebration in New Orleans, will be remembered at a service to be held at noon Feb. 5 at Kol Tikvah Synagogue in Woodland Hills.

Silberman, 31, who was living in Brighton, Mass., went to the city with a few friends from Boston.

“They were waiting for the festivities to begin,” said Silberman’s mother, Eudice Margolis Bernstein, who moved to Woodland Hills three years ago. “The girls said they heard a pop, and then Amy was at their feet.”

At first, Silberman’s friends thought she had fallen and hurt herself. But when she was taken to the hospital, doctors discovered a bullet had lodged in her neck. She died in the emergency room.

Bernstein said if Silberman and her friends had known that it was a popular New Year’s Eve custom in New Orleans to fire shots into the air, “They never would have gone.”

She said she was told by New Orleans police that many people have been injured by such random gunfire, but that her daughter was the first fatality. Police have made no arrests, Bernstein said.

Amy Silberman worked as an executive assistant for International Data Group, which publishes computer magazines.

Her mother said she also loved to write, and that one of her plays, “Buying Rilke for the Newsboys,” was staged in Boston in 1993.

It dealt with women attracted to rock musicians and how it affected their lives.

“She was always incredibly warm and upbeat,” Bernstein said. “She had a quality which made everyone confide in her, even way back from elementary school.”

Bernstein said the family has requested that any donations be sent to the Amy Margolis Silberman Fund for Arts in Education, c/o of Shaker Schools Foundation, 15600 Parkland Ave., Shaker Heights, Ohio 44120.