Hope Ritter was the mother of a 10-year-old daughter and was studying to become a barber. Two people have been arrested in connection with the shooting death of a bartender in downtown Las Vegas in early February. On Monday, the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department announced the arrests of Philip Strong, 18, and Charles Wright, 20, as suspects in the killing of 29-year-old Hope Ritter.
According to police, Wright was already in custody in the Clark County Detention Center on unrelated charges. Andrew Mendez, the general manager at Atomic Liquors, told the outlet that police described the incident as "random violence.". According to investigators, Ritter and her friend were sitting in a vehicle and talking when a pair of men walked past them. The police said that "moments later, shots were fired striking the victim." She died at the scene.
Ritter was the mother of a 10-year-old daughter. "Everything she did, she did for her daughter, to give her daughter a better life than she had, and that's how we want people to remember her," Mendez said. He said Ritter was someone who made people feel welcome at the bar. He said she had been studying to become a barber and was only weeks away from graduating from her program when she was killed.
“Every moment spent with her was great, honestly. We had fun, it was a blast,” Ritter's coworker, Maria Ledesma, said. “If I could have the chance to meet her again, I’ll do it again. She was just an awesome woman, hard-working woman, very determined to improve herself all the time, and make a better future for her daughter.".
The memorial also served as a fundraiser for Ritter's daughter. Mendez said all of the bar's revenue on Sunday would go toward Ritter's daughter, and that donation boxes would be left in the bar for the next four weeks to collect more funds for the 10-year-old.
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