A third person with Utah origins has died of injuries suffered in Sunday’s mass shooting in Las Vegas.
Heather Warino Alvarado, a 35-year-old Cedar City woman, died Monday night at a Las Vegas hospital, Cedar City police Sgt. Jerry Womack confirmed Tuesday. She and her husband, Cedar City firefighter Albert Alvarado, have three children.
Fifty-nine people — including the gunman — died after bullets rained down from Stephen Paddock’s 32nd floor room at the Mandalay Bay hotel onto a crowd of 22,000 people packed into an outdoor country music festival venue. More than 500 others were injured by bullets, shrapnel, trampling, or falling as they tried to escape by scaling 10-foot-high fences, Las Vegas police said.
“Our thoughts and prayers go out to the entire Alvarado/Warino family,” Womack wrote in a statement.
A statement from Albert Alvarado, who had not attended the Route 91 Harvest Festival, said his wife “always saw the good in others” and had spent her life serving her family and community. They loved traveling, he said, from day trips to ocean cruises.
“She was happiest when she was together with her family, especially her children and she would do ANYTHING for them,” the statement from Albert Alvarado said.
Friends and family on Monday had been trying to track down Alvarado and learn details of her condition.
“Checking to see if all of you are ok?” Tammy Anderson wrote on her friend‘s Facebook profile picture, which appeared to be taken at the festival on Friday afternoon. It showed a grinning Alvarado alongside several friends, with a music stage in the background.
“Heather was always the first to help anyone and was always so loving,” wrote her friend Megan Gadd.
For those wishing to contribute to funeral, medical and other costs, an account has been opened at the State Bank of Utah in Heather Alvarado’s name. A GoFundMe page also has been set up to help the family.
On Monday authorities had confirmed that former Salt Lake City resident Neysa Tonks, 46, and St. George-area resident Cameron Robinson, 28, also had died in the massacre.
Tonks was raised in Utah and graduated from Brighton High School, though in recent years she had been living in Las Vegas. The mother of three worked for a California-based IT firm, Technologent, which had organized a GoFundMe page to raise money for funeral costs and other expenses. Her brother told The Washington Post that she loved taking her kids to the beach and would ski whenever she returned to Utah.
“She was just completely outgoing,” Cody Davis said.
Robinson lived in St. George and commuted to work for the city of Las Vegas as a legal-records specialist. He had created a smartphone app that helped attendees navigate the city’s annual conferences, and he often volunteered at city events, the Las Vegas city attorney told The New York Times.
A GoFundMe page to raise funeral and medical expenses for Robinson’s family said he enjoyed cooking, entertaining, running, travel and many outdoor pursuits.
“He is an amazing example to all and brought so much light to those he came in contact with,” the post by Valerie Alvey said. “He accomplished so much in such a short time and touched the lives of so many.”
Robinson owned a home in Las Vegas, but he chose to stay in St. George with his boyfriend, Robert Eardley, and Eardley’s three children, according to family members who spoke to The Post.
Robinson and Eardley attended the festival together. Eardley felt shrapnel on his back after the shooting began, and Robinson was shot in the neck, according to family and co-workers.
Robinson died in his boyfriend’s arms.
Las Vegas police ended the Sunday night horror when they stormed the hotel room from where Stephen Paddock allegedly had fired hundreds of rounds from an automatic weapon into the crowd below.
Inside, they found Paddock dead from an apparently self-inflicted gunshot wound, surrounded by nearly two dozen firearms and bags of ammunition.
His motives for the attack remained a mystery as of Tuesday.