Students and instructors at De Anza College were shocked when they learned about the March 3 shooting death of freshman Richard Vega, 18, of Santa Clara.
Vega was shot and killed while walking in a Campbell residential area.
The shooter’s motive is unknown. Vega happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time, said Vega’s sister, Nancy Vega Carbajal.
Richard Vega was born on July 27, 1994, and graduated from Santa Clara High School,
where he played football.
Many who knew Vega at De Anza remembered him as being bright and easy going.
“He was always full of life. He was a very vibrant guy, he always had something funny to say,” said Kevin Luu, De Anza student, who had a civics class with Vega at Santa Clara high and always sat next to him.
“I didn’t believe it,” said De Anza student Rey Murillo, who had seen Vega the week before his shooting. “I thought it was a joke.”
Murillo had played on the Santa Clara High football team with Vega. Some of his best memories with Vega were the “good times” they shared on the field, and starting off the games their senior year, he said.
Vega was “one of the nicest kids you’d ever meet,” Murillo said. “He just wanted the best for people.”
Veronica Avila, De Anza Reading Department chairman, who had Vega in a First year Experience class fall quarter 2012, said he was a
bright student.
“I saw a lot of potential in him,” she said. “He was one of those students, if they had the privilege of time and space, they would do really well.”
“Everyone mentions his smile, but he was someone who had a really positive energy,” said Vega’s sociology instructor this winter quarter, Jennifer Myhre.
“I know it mattered to him to be in college,” she said. “He was really excited to be here.”
Myhres said Vega made a poster for her sociology class that she will never forget. The assignment was to create a political poster that made a claim about a social problem.
Vega’s poster focused on peace, depicting a white dove that shot out of a gun, with the quote: “An eye 4 an eye will only make the world blind by Mahatma Gandi.”
Myhre said the picture was “beautiful and totally painful given what happened.”
Vega’s funeral was on March 13 at the Oak Hill Funeral Home and Memorial Park in San Jose. Pictures of his prom, with his family and friends were placed along the entrance of
the funeral home.
Rev. Jose Lemuel Garcia spoke of Vega being at peace and said Vega was “in the presence of God.”
Vega is survived by his parents, and his brother and sister, Adrian Vega and Nancy Crabajal Vega. Vega’s football jersey hung on the casket door. The colors were blue and gold with the number 55 printed on it.
ATHLETE – Vega in action at a Santa Clara High School football game. He was a starter in his senior year. (Richard Vega’s FACEBOOK)
EYE FOR AN EYE – A picture drawn by Richard Vega for a class brings a message for peace. The De Anza student was murdered March 13. (courtesy of Richard Vega’s FACEBOOK)
