Ngoc Lan/RFA
Tin Nguyen, 31, wasn’t supposed to be at the Inland Regional Center Wednesday, when Syed Farook and his wife, Tashfeen Malik, 27, opened fire and killed Nguyen and 13 others. Nguyen’s uncle, Phu Nguyen, spoke to RFA contributor Ngoc Lan about the day of the attack and how things unfolded.
Tin Nguyen, a 31-year-old food inspector for the San Bernardino County Department of Health, lost her life in the San
Bernardino massacre. Family members said she was looking forward to getting married in 2016. (Photo courtesy Nguyen family)
“Everyday at 1:00 p.m., Nguyen called home to check in with her mother,” Nguyen said. “She also texted her cousins in a group text at 10:34 a.m. planning a reunion in Las Vegas Dec.18-20. When we didn’t hear from her, her mother called me crying and said something must have been wrong for her to not pick up.”
Nguyen, a health inspector for the San Bernardino County Health Department, rarely stayed at the office long. According to her uncle, she would generally go pick up the forms needed for her daily work and then head out to the different establishments she was assigned to. But Nguyen stayed to partake in the holiday party that was taking place that day in the conference room at the Inland Regional Center.
Balloons adorn a makeshift memorial site honoring the victims of Wednesday’s shooting rampage. The FBI said Friday it is
officially investigating the mass shooting in California as an act of terrorism, while a U.S. law enforcement official said the
woman who carried out the attack with her husband had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group and its leader
on Facebook. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)
According to Phu, after reports of a shooting took place, Nguyen’s boyfriend and her brother went to the Inland Regional Center to see if they could find out more but police had cordoned off the area. They then went to the area hospitals asking if she had been admitted.
“They waited until around 8:00 -9:00 p.m. and waited for the buses of people who had been released from the buildings come by,” Phu said. “They waited for the first bus and no sign of Tin. And then the final bus came and Tin was not on it. So aside from the 17 people who were injured and the people released from the bus, there was no one left.”
From there, the family deduced that Tin must have been one of the 14 people who lost their lives. But still they prayed for a miracle.
Candles are placed at a makeshift memorial site honoring the victims of Wednesday’s shooting rampage, Friday, Dec. 4,
2015. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)
“We continued to text and call her non-stop but only heard the dial tone,”said Phu. “In the morning, the representative for the coroner’s office came out and confirmed that Tin was among the deceased.”
For Phu, who said their family was a close knit one, the loss of Tin is unreal.
“Everyone thinks their child is the best, but I can truly say that Tin was a special gift to our family,” Phu said. “From the time she was a child until now, she just took care of everyone. She drove to work in San Bernardino every day at 5:00 a.m., and on her way home, she always stopped by her grandmother’s to say hello before she went home. How could someone that good leave us so soon?”
To read more, click here: http://www.rfa.org/vietnamese/in_depth/one-vietnamese-died-cali-mass-shooting-nl-12042015100441.html
