Campus, community mourn loss of AU student
Special to the News
Auburn police have confirmed that they are investigating the death of 18-year-old Auburn University student Lauren A. Burk as a homicide.
Advertisement
Text size: small | medium | large
By Donathan Prater
Published: March 5, 2008
Auburn University students gathered Wednesday evening to remember a young woman, who one friend described as a “free spirit” and “well-liked.”
Auburn freshman Lauren A. Burk, of Marietta, Ga., died Tuesday night after being shot. While investigators tried to piece together the events that lead to her death, family, friends and peers gathered to pay their respects.
Nearly 100 students, including her sisters in the Delta Gamma sorority, gathered for a prayer vigil in the parking lot where her torched car had been discovered the night before.
Just after 9 p.m. Tuesday, Auburn police responded to a call of an “injured female,” later identified as Burk, on U.S. Highway 147 who suffered a gunshot wound, according to police reports. Less than half an hour later, the Auburn Fire Division responded to a car fire in a campus parking lot. That vehicle was later determined to belong to Burk.
During the vigil, the Delta Gamma sisters gathered in a semi-circle around the parking space where fragments and glass from her charred car remained Wednesday afternoon.
The news of Burk’s death sent shockwaves through the Marietta, Ga., and Auburn communities.
“She (Lauren) was a great student, a great kid and a great leader just like so many of the other kids we send to Auburn University,” said Dr. Tom Higgins, principal of Walton High School in Marietta where Burk graduated last year. “We notified our staff and faculty about the incident this morning and will make counselors available to assist grieving students.”
One of Burk’s former high school colleagues and current AU student, Elizabeth Chandler, 18, remembers Burk as a person everyone liked.
“I know when someone dies everyone talks about how good they were, but Lauren really was a gorgeous person,” said Chandler who recalls Burk being a very outgoing and active student who played lacrosse and was part of the homecoming court at Walton High.
Chandler learned of Burk’s death this morning when she checked her cell phone and found several messages from current Walton High students.
From what Chandler said she understands thus far, Burk may have been killed some time after she left Sasnett Hall after visiting her boyfriend, Sean McQuade, also a former Walton High student and current AU student.
“They ( Lauren and Sean) were the cutest couple,” said Chandler, a Marietta native.
Jay Seyfried, a junior at Auburn University and also a graduate of Walton High where Burk attended, was a mutual friend of Burk and McQuade.
The junior International Business student learned that Lauren had gone missing around 10:30 p.m. Tuesday night after dropping of an item on campus.
The idea that Burk’s killer was someone she knew is one Seyfried finds difficult to accept.
“Lauren was such a good judge of character,” Seyfried said. “She would never have been with someone she didn’t feel comfortable with.”
While he personally feels safe on the Auburn University campus, Seyfried said he’ll be more concerned about his girlfriend and other young women he knows as they travel on campus.
Chandler expressed similar concerns , but her thoughts and prayers are still with her fallen friend Lauren.
One of her (Lauren) favorite songs was Coldplay’s ‘(Don’t Panic)Beautiful World,’” said Chandler. “Today the world doesn’t look so beautiful.”
Post a Comment
Please Log In
Comment posting requires free registration with Opelika-Auburn News.
Already have an account? Please log in.
Can't find what you're looking for? Try our quick search:
Reader Reactions
Posted by ( Vivvy ) on March 11, 2008 at 2:53 pm
Well, Virgil, if you are aware of your surroundings when you are in a highly or not so highly populated area, that sort of thing won’t happen. Too many times, victims of that circumstance were caught off guard.
Posted by ( Virgil Soule ) on March 09, 2008 at 6:14 pm
Let’s say you have a snub-nose 44 Magnum tucked in your armpit and a bad guy comes up on your blind side and sticks a gun in your ear. What are you going to do? If the crook thinks you might be armed (or just doesn’t like you), he will shoot you just to ensure his own escape. The gangs down in DC only take guns out if they have a job to do. Otherwise, they stay hidden. The only way to improve public safety is to squeeze guns out of the system. Double or triple possession penalties. Make use of a handgun in commission of a crime a life sentence. It shouldn’t take long for the crooks to get the message.
Posted by ( Big Tex ) on March 09, 2008 at 2:24 pm
If you outlaw guns then only outlaws will have guns.
Posted by ( Vivvy ) on March 08, 2008 at 12:32 pm
In response to Virgil’s comment, after handguns were banned in Washington, DC, the crime rate more than doubled. Are you suggesting that we take guns away from the citizens, while the thugs and trash who use them against us are able to access them freely? When someone wants to commit a crime, do you think they are going to be looking for legal ways to obtain a gun? While we’re at it, let’s take butcher knives out of the kitchens of Americans. How many people have been bludgeoned to death by a butcher knife or a pocket knife? While we’re taking away the constitutional rights of every American, let’s just take away their cars, too. Every 12 minutes there is at least one fatal car crash in America. Do you honestly believe Lockhart owned a pistol permit? How many criminals who are willing and sorry enough to commit a crime as horrific as what Lauren Burk went through obtained their pistol legally? You can buy guns on the street just the same way you can buy drugs! What America needs is to fry the s.o.b. at the stake when they commit a crime as cruel and hateful as this one!
Posted by ( Virgil Soule ) on March 08, 2008 at 1:50 am
As long as handguns are freely available in our society, we must accept incidents like Lauren Burk’s murder as a matter of course.
Posted by ( Raleigh girl ) on March 06, 2008 at 3:39 pm
The UNC Student Body President was also from Georgia. She was from Athens. Very strange similarities for these events to have happened so close together. Two bright, beautiful young women have been taken from their families and friends so unnecessarily. My deepest sorrows for all those touched by these tragedies.
Posted by ( Good Citizen ) on March 06, 2008 at 1:31 pm
The student body president (a female)at UNC Chapel Hill was found shot to death and laying in an intersection early Wednesday morning. How freaky is that?
http://www.newsobserver.com/news/crime_safety/story/985826.html
Posted by ( whatif? ) on March 06, 2008 at 12:29 pm
I agree that we shouldn’t come up with all these scenarios, however likely or not - and certainly jumping to conclusions about a serial killer isn’t helping either - but there are so many of us that are concerned and just don’t know what else to do. I am the type of person who needs to know what’s going on in their community, and when something like this happens and there are no answers, I can’t help but search for them on my own. I know that the police and other officials are doing the best that they can, and I want to give them a break, but it’s hard to accept such a tragedy in our little community - it’s weird coming to campus today not knowing what’s going on, not trusting your surroundings. I don’t live in fear, but these ARE uncertain times and it’s just very unsettling. But I will continue to hope and pray for especially for Lauren’s family, friends, and loved ones.
Posted by ( crappiefisher ) on March 06, 2008 at 11:18 am
I’m new to the area. Not a student but a faculty spouse. Seems kind of scary thinking that there’s a psychopath out there targeting female college students. Although the police report they feel there is no link, does not mean that they really DO think there is one. They have to be careful what they report publicly. So give them some space and respect. The police and security forces are more connected than you think.
You young folks make sure that you never walk alone regardles of how short the trip. Back in my college days there was a suspected serial killer in the area where I lived and went to school (NE La). The buddy-system was kind of enforced at my little, quiet school. Years later I’m watching a show on serial killers and there’s this guy that has confessed to killing across the nation, 2 of his victims from the parish where I lived during the time that I lived there. One was a girl that worked at theatre where I worked. She was killed a few months before I started. The manager there would walk all girls to their calls and you were required to call him when you got home. He was a part-time cop and lives with this guilt that he could have prevented that girl’s death. pretty scary stuff. Be safe, but do not live in fear.
Auburn is a great place. Psycho’s are everywhere - they don’t just live in heavy populated areas. But their actions are readily aparrent when they occur in quiet areas like Auburn compared to places like Cincinnati or NYC.
God bless the families and friends of these girls.
Posted by ( sash ) on March 06, 2008 at 10:13 am
I am wondering if the AUPD are checking into some of these construction companies’ workers. I remember a couple of summers ago, a girl at Clemson University was found dead and they tracked her murder to a construction worker, who had also killed some women in other southern states. The AUPD should find out if a construction worker might have left shortly after the Lori Slesinski incident and maybe has recently shown back up for work. The car fires are jsut too similar to ignore.