Details of victims from Las Vegas mass shooting emerge as grief spreads through US

Victims range from army veterans, police officers to mothers and teachers


News Desk October 03, 2017
An injured person is tended to in the intersection of Tropicana Ave. and Las Vegas Boulevard after a mass shooting at a country music festival nearby on October 2, 2017 in Las Vegas, Nevada. PHOTO: AFP

After the gruesome mass shooting in Las Vegas on Monday night led to the killing of more than 50 people and left more than 500 injured, details of the deceased have emerged, reported BBC.


Among those who lost their lives was an off-duty Las Vegas police officer who was identified by friends speaking to the Las Vegas Review-Journal. Thirty-four-year-old Charleston Hartfield was a military veteran who also coached youth football.




The Tennessean reports the death of Sonny Melton, 29. The paper quotes his wife, Heather, as saying the nurse saved her life by grabbing her as the shooting started. She says he was shot in the back. Another woman from West Virginia, Denise Burditus, was at the festival with her husband Tony. He later wrote on Facebook that she died in his arms. She was a mother of two and "soon to be a grandmother of five", he wrote.

58 killed, 515 injured at Las Vegas concert in deadliest US shooting

A special education teacher from Manhattan Beach in California, Sandy Casey, died after being shot in the back. She was with her fiancé, Christopher Willemse at the concert. Manhattan Beach Middle School, where they were colleagues, described her as "absolutely loved by students and colleagues alike". She had "made a tremendous difference in the lives of our students and their families," Superintendent Mike Matthews was quoted as saying on ABC7.



Among the casualties was also a Navy veteran who had recently returned from Afghanistan. Chris Roybal was at the concert with his mother and had been separated from her. "He went to combat and came back without being injured, and then goes to a concert and dies," she told NBC4.



At least three Canadians are among the dead, CBC reports. It names one as Jordan McIldoon, 23 and a mechanic's apprentice, from British Columbia. He was attending the country music festival with his girlfriend.

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