(TheRedAlertNews.com) – A US Marine Corps combat veteran with tours in Iraq and Afghanistan was shot and killed while working as an Uber driver in California.
38-year-old former Marine Aaron Orozco perished after getting in a “physical altercation” with two riders in Lynwood, a city in Los Angeles County, Newsmax reported.
According to the LA Police Department, during the fight at a 7-Eleven, Orozco was shot dead by one of the two riders, who then escaped from the scene in the combat veteran’s car.
The police officers found Orozco’s vehicle, a Honda Accord, abandoned close to the crime scene.
It remains unknown why the former US Marine stopped at the store where one of the passengers pulled out a firearm and shot him dead.
Some of the reports referred to the incident as a carjacking attempt. The police were alerted by a store clerk who witnessed the murder. They found Orozco’s body on the ground in the parking lot.
“Our hearts are with Mr. Orozco Figueroa’s family as they cope with this unfathomable tragedy, and we have reached out to offer our condolences,” Uber said in a statement on the Marine vet’s murder.
“We banned the rider’s account and are working with police on their investigation,” the company added.
Orozco’s killing has left his two kids – a 9-year-old boy and a 3-year-old girl – fatherless.
The former US Marine drove Uber at night to care for his children during the day when his wife worked as a nurse. Aaron Orozco and his wife, Sandra Medina, have been married for ten years.
“It just seems like I’m in a nightmare. It doesn’t seem real to me,” Medina told Fox-11.
“I haven’t even told my kids yet, they still think dad is going to come through the door,” she said.
Her husband served in the US Marine Corps between 2001 and 2005, the years after the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001.
Orozco was stationed at Camp Pendleton, the main base of the US Marines on the West Coast.
He saw combat in both Iraq and Afghanistan, doing three deployments overseas.
“I just really hope that they find [the suspects] because they created this chaos in my life, in my family’s life,” the former Marine’s wife told ABC 7.
“And now. I don’t have my husband with me and it’s just changed my life around, so I really hope that they do catch them,” she added.
According to LAPD data, the report points out that car theft in California has spiked by 61.5% compared with 2019, the last year before the COVID-19 pandemic.
A U.S. Marine combat veteran and father driving Uber was shot and killed by a rider Friday morning. https://t.co/z1kTyrfRfW
— NEWSMAX (@NEWSMAX) March 26, 2023
