It was a Valentine’s Day that Terra Pinkard would never forget; the last one she would spend with the love of her life.
The day after her husband Josh Pinkard went to work at valve manufacturer Henry Pratt Co, in Aurora, Illinois, as usual, where he was plant manager.
In the afternoon Terra received a text from her husband which read, “I love you, I’ve been shot at work.”
“It took me several times reading it for it to hit me that it was for real,” Pinkard wrote in a Facebook post.
“I called his phone several times, text, FaceTime, nothing.”
When she saw the text she immediately drove to her husband’s pace of work and then to two hospitals where she waited for hours.
One of five shot dead
It was only then she discovered that her beloved husband was one of five people who had been shot at the plant.
Fellow worker Gary Montez Martin went on a shooting spree, that started after learning he was to be fired from his job.
The 45-year-old was shot and killed by police.
Police released the names of the five workers killed: Plant manager Josh Pinkard, human resources manager Clayton Parks, Human resources intern Trevor Wehner, mold operator Russell Beyer and stock room attendant and fork life operator Vicente Juarez of Oswego.
According to Today, all five, apart from 21-year-old Trevor Wehner who was shot on his first day at the plant, were fathers with Vincente Juarez a father and grandfather to 8.
“With my pastor’s help, since family was still on planes to get to us, I told my children their dad did not make it and is in heaven with Jesus. I’ve never had to do something that hard,” Terra Pinkard wrote on Facebook.
She wrote that she cannot talk about her husband without breaking down.
‘He would always love me’
“I’m crying now as I write this. I want to shout from the rooftops about how amazing Josh was!” the post reads.
“The man who was dying and found the clarity of mind for just a second to send me one last text to let me know he would always love me.”
Around 1,700 people endured freezing rain to attend two vigils held in the local community on Sunday.
Find out more about this tragic story in the video below.
[arve url=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9XTfYl_QGmg” /]
This senseless violence has to stop, too many families have been left heartbroken, without their loved ones. Please share as a tribute to those men who lost their lives.
