Three were shot to death while working in a Colorado supermarket. Another was a police officer who ran to try to rescue them and others from the attack that left 10 dead.
A photo of the victims of Monday’s shooting began to emerge a day later, when the suspect in the murders was arrested for homicide after being treated in a hospital.
Those who lost their lives at the King Soopers store in Boulder were 20 to 65 years old. They included a magazine photographer, a Medicare agent with a passion for theater, and others who spent their days in a busy shopping center.
They were identified as Denny Stong, 20; Neven Stanisic, 23; Rikki Olds, 25; Tralona Bartkowiak, 49; Officer Eric Talley, 51; Suzanne Fountain, 59; Teri Leiker, 51; Kevin Mahoney, 61; Lynn Murray, 62; and Jodi Waters, 65.
Leiker, Olds and Stong worked at the supermarket, said former colleague Jordan Sailas, who never had a chance to bring his baby son to the store to meet them.
ERIC TALLEY
He joined the police force in Boulder in 2010 with a background that included a master’s degree in computer communication, his father said.
“At 40, he decided he wanted to serve his community,” Homer “Shay” Talley, 74, told the Associated Press of his ranch in central Texas. “He left his office work. He just wanted to serve and that’s what he did. He simply liked the police family. “
Eric Talley was the first to arrive after a call about shots being fired and someone carrying a rifle, said Boulder Police Chief Maris Herold.
Talley was “by all accounts, one of the most prominent officers” in the department, said Boulder County District Attorney Michael Dougherty.
Talley’s father said his son – who had seven children, aged 7 to 20 years old – was a dedicated father who “knew the Lord”.
“When everyone in the parking lot was running away, he ran towards him,” said Shay Talley.
“We know where he is,” he added. “He loved his family more than anything. He was not afraid to die. He was afraid to put them in that situation. “
Talley graduated from high school in Albuquerque, New Mexico, in 1988. The school superintendent expressed his condolences and praised “the example that Officer Talley sets us”.
LYNN MURRAY
Murray was shopping at King Soopers, where a friend’s daughter had seen her. The news reached her husband, John Mackenzie, who drove to the store and started texting his wife.
After getting no response in about five minutes, “I just fell into my chair,” he said, choking.
Murray has had a long career taking pictures for magazines like Cosmopolitan and Vogue, said Mackenzie.
“She charmed me a lot” when they met at a photo studio in New York City years ago, he said. Backgammon games on the computer soon evolved into a relationship and, eventually, two children.
“She is the nicest person I have ever met, without a doubt. She had an aura about her that was the most incredible thing you would like to know. She was just a nice girl, ”said Mackenzie. “She had everything under control – she really did.”
He said he spent hours comforting his children before “losing control” on Tuesday morning. Mackenzie offered a message:
“Don’t live in fear. My wife, none of the victims, would ever want you to live in fear. They would like you to be more daring and to live with more daring. That’s what this place is about. “
SOURCE OF SUZANNE
Fountain was an actress and mother who later won over loyal clients as a Medicare agent, doing extensive research to find the right supplemental coverage for older adults who signed up for the federal health insurance program, said life partner Phi Bernier.
“She never saved, she never did anything because it was easier,” he said.
Fountain studied at Circle at Square Theater School and the two met while playing lead roles in “The Glass Menagerie”, about 30 years ago, said Bernier. They dated for a while and then reconnected after Fountain came to see him in a play in 2013.
Until the pandemic, Fountain was also the manager of eTown, a nonprofit live music venue in Boulder.
“Suzanne was a bright light for everyone she met, and we were proud to have her representing eTown in our community by welcoming people into our space hundreds and hundreds of times,” said the organization in a Facebook post.
Fountain has won praise for her performance both by critics and those who have worked with her.
“She was absolutely adorable, natural, someone you just wouldn’t forget,” said Brian Miller, who worked with her on a show, to The Denver Post.
A Boulder Daily Camera critic said that her 2002 role as a nurse in “Wit”, a Pulitzer Prize-winning play about a woman dealing with cancer, brought “a simple but crucial compassion to the play”.
RIKKI OLDS
Front-end manager at King Soopers, Olds aspired to move up the store hierarchy, his family said.
“She was 25 years old, kind of starting life, cheerful, full of energy and charismatic,” said her uncle Robert Olds.
He said he still remembers the preschooler niece who would accompany him and his children to baseball tournaments and ask to go to McDonald’s afterwards.
“We are devastated,” said Robert Olds. He added that the family heard from one of their friends that she was trying to lock the store doors after the shooting started in the parking lot.
Her grandmother gasped on the phone when describing the young woman she played an important role in raising.
“She was a very kind, loving and cheerful person who lit up the room when she entered,” said Jeanette Olds, 71, from Lafayette, Colorado.
KEVIN MAHONEY
He “represents all things of love,” said his daughter Erika Mahoney in a moving tweet that brought a wedding photo and drew attention on social networks.
“I am very grateful that he accompanied me to the altar last summer,” added Mahoney, who is the news director for a public radio station in California.
She also posted that she is pregnant and knows that her father “wants me to be strong for his granddaughter”.
TERI LEIKER
The former King Soopers employee loved to watch the University of Colorado band perform at an initial celebration called Pearl Street Stampede on Friday nights before the football games at home on the Boulder campus, band director Matt Dockendorf told the The Denver Post.
“She was there even before we started meeting, half an hour before the stampede started,” said Dockendorf. “She was just a staple. She was a kind of personal cheerleader for the band. ”
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Associated Press writers Patty Nieberg in Boulder, Colorado, and Susan Montoya Bryan in Albuquerque, New Mexico, contributed. Nieberg is a member of the Associated Press / Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a national nonprofit service program that puts journalists in local newsrooms to report on covert issues.