A woman who was the only victim killed Thursday at a Kroger grocery store in Collierville, Tennessee, was a 70-year-old mother of three grown children and a devout Catholic who attended Mass only hours before the mass shooting.
Olivia King was shot in the chest, and emergency officials administered CPR but were unable to save her life. She died soon after arriving at a nearby hospital, her son Wes King said on Facebook.
“Dear friends, it is with a heavy heart that I must inform you that my mother has died,” he wrote. “I cannot believe I am typing this, but my mother Olivia King was one of the victims today at the shooting in Collierville at Kroger.”
King was originally from San Antonio but had been a resident of Collierville since the mid-1990s, according to the Memphis Commercial Appeal. She was a member of the Catholic Church of the Incarnation and had previously worked as a secretary at one of the schools in the suburban community that sits 30 miles east of Memphis.
She had three sons — one in the Navy, another in the Air Force and a third who had just earned a doctoral degree, the newspaper reported, citing family friends.
After her husband died in 2005, she moved in with her son Wes and his family before they recently moved to Ohio, according to The New York Times.
“Our family is devastated by this senseless act of violence. We ask that you pray for the repose of the soul of our mother, Olivia,” Wes King told ABC News. “We also ask everyone for their prayers for all families and friends affected by the events today, as well as for God’s mercy on the shooter and his family.”
By all accounts, King was a caring person who went out of her way to help others.
Maureen Fraser, the vice mayor of Collierville, described King as “kind, generous, caring, selfless,” according to the Commercial Appeal.
Fraser recounted a fond memory about the time King gave her family an envelope full of money at Christmastime after Fraser’s husband, David, lost his job.
“Everyone needs to be more like Olivia,” she told the newspaper.
King was well-liked throughout the Collierville community.
Neighbor Aahil Shermohammed told the Times he would never forget her smile.
“She was always checking up on me for no reason,” he said, “and it was always nice when you’re having a bad day to have someone like that smile at you.”
Fourteen other people were wounded before the suspected shooter was found dead of an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound at the store, according to reports.
Some of the wounded were still in critical condition and fighting for their lives, Collierville Police Chief Dale Lane said at a Friday morning news conference, according to The Associated Press.
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