<b>UPDATE</b>
12:50 p.m.: More than 2,000 donators have raised more than $110,300 for Nathan Trapuzzano’s family.
And that number is continuing to rise with each page refresh.
<b>PREVIOUS</b>
A recent Ball State graduate was murdered during his morning walk on the west side of Indianapolis on Tuesday morning.
Nathan Trapuzzano, 24, graduated from Ball State in 2011. He had recently married his wife, Jennifer, who is pregnant with their first child, Cecilia.
On Wednesday, Chelsea Ransom posted a GoFundMe fundraiser to pay for Trapuzzano’s funeral expenses and to care for his unborn child, who is due within in the next month.
As of publication, the fund has donations from 1,734 people for a total of $92,546, just short of its $100,000 goal.
Trapuzzano worked as a software engineer at Ivy Tech Community College. The college released a statement saying it will grant a full, two-year Ivy Tech scholarship to the unborn child.
Trapuzzano was shot just before 6 a.m. Tuesday and died in Eskenazi Hospital soon after, according to The Indy Star.
Chris Shea, a Ball State professor of classics, worked closely with Trapuzzano when he studied in the classical languages.
She said he was generous with his time, often volunteering to tutor peers and high school students in Latin without pay.
“He put in a lot of time and a lot of people knew him on campus,” Shea said. “He made a real contribution. He wasn’t just a student who arrived, took classes and went home.”
Trapuzzano was active in the Newman Center community, the Ball State Honors College and Eta Sigma Phi, a national classics honorary.
Shea said he was one of her best students but he was more than that — he was a friend who will be missed.
“He was somebody who really lived the communal life of the university,” she said. “He was a great student and a great human being.”
