SAN DIEGO (Border Report) — The 21 people who were killed in what became known as the “McDonald’s massacre” were remembered by friends, family and members of the San Ysidro community on Thursday morning.
The tragedy took place July 18, 1984.
A monument erected in their honor six years after the massacre took place was decorated with flowers and pictures of the victims.
“It was horrible, an event we could never imagine. How could this happen?” asked Alice De La Torre, a lifelong San Ysidro resident. “The whole town was upset and in disbelief, crying, and asking the Lord why, why San Ysidro?”
The site where the massacre took place is now a satellite campus for Southwestern College Community College.
A large tent with and rows of chairs was installed on the main parking lot to accommodate those who attended the memorial.
Many others stood around the tent listening to speakers like Guillermo Flores, whose brother David was killed that day.
“It’s been 40 years, and it does seem like yesterday, the pain never goes away, you just have to deal with it,” said Flores.
At the time, the McDonald’s massacre was the largest mass killing in U.S. history.
Twenty-one men, women and children, including an 8-month-old baby named Carlos Reyes Jr., lost their lives.
“These tragedies have happened way more since 1984, and that was my fear back then, what if someone wants to break that record of 21, it’s happened many times over,” said Flores, whose mother, Maria, also attended the event.
She spoke with Border Report and other members of the media after the memorial was over.
“First and foremost, he’s always in my heart and mind,” said Maria Flores. “My boy came to the restaurant with some friends to get ice cream, he actually got there first and came out to greet them.”
Flores said her son and his friends went to the McDonald’s because the restaurant had a promotion that day giving away ice cream cones.
One of David’s friends, Omar Hernandez, was also killed, but the other boy, Joshua Coleman, survived by playing dead after being shot by James Huberty, the assailant who had told his wife he was going “hunting, hunting for humans.”
Huberty was killed by a San Diego police sniper 77 minutes after he started firing several weapons.
Other family members politely declined requests for interviews.
One man who lost his mother did say he appreciated everyone who attended the memorial and thank those who have remembered and prayed for the victims and their families during the last 40 years.