Thanks for this article. I didn't see that one coming either! Some snippets:
Nearly ten years before
Ayoola Ajayi was accused of
killing a University of Utah student, LD says he was baptized into The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
[...]
LD baptized Ajayi in October 2009. He has extensive reflections about Ajayi’s conversion story in a well-worn journal, but now hindsight is anything but 20/20.
[...]
LD knew Ajayi simply as “Joy” during their time together in northern Utah.
“It’s harder to say his name so he wanted to pick an easy American name, so Joy,” he said.
The two men were friends during Ajayi’s early days in the LDS community, but LD returned to his native Oklahoma at the end of his two-year mission and eventually the two lost touch. They lost communication in 2012.
[...]
He’s incredibly saddened by Lueck’s death and the possibility his friend could be responsible. He struggled for words for Lueck’s family.
“I would say to them I’m sorry for having so many good things to say about Joy because that’s the person that I knew,” he said. “I really would like to figure out like what fork in the road, what decision he made that pretty much took him like 180 [degrees].”