The ninth anniversary of the 2015 mass shooting in San Bernardino that caused the deaths of 14 people was a quiet affair Monday, Dec. 2.
At San Bernardino County’s Curtain of Courage memorial, the anniversary was commemorated with a brief prayer, a moment of silence and roses left behind at the memorials for each victim.
“Lives were cut too short,” said Samuel Roberts, a chaplain with the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department, “by hatred and anger.”
On Dec. 2, 2015, county Environmental Health Services employees were at an off-site training event at the Inland Regional Center in San Bernardino. An employee and his wife opened fire on them in a meeting room before they themselves were killed in a gun battle with police. The FBI later declared the shooting a terrorist attack, although the couple had acted independently of any established terrorist group.
“Be with us, Lord,” Roberts said. “Give us the peace, give us understanding. Be with the family of the ones that were lost, also the families of the ones who survived that still bear the scars. … We pray that you will continue to provide peace and comfort for the families and for the coworkers.”
Thirteen of the 14 victims were county employees.
After the prayer at the memorial Monday, there was a moment of silence at 10:55 a.m., the time of the attack on Dec. 2, 2015.
The Curtain of Courage, located on the east side of the San Bernardino County Government Center in San Bernardino, opened in 2022. It has alcoves honoring each of the people killed, with custom touches celebrating the lives of each of them, chosen by their loved ones.
Arlen Verdehyou, the husband of Bennetta Bebadal, one of the 14 people killed in the 2015 attack, left peach-colored roses for the victims in the different alcoves, alongside white and red roses others had left earlier.
“It’s perfect for us, the memorial,” Verdehyou said of the Curtain of Courage after the ceremony. “It’s more than we asked for.”
There is comfort in small, quiet ceremonies like the one held Monday, he said.
“Coming here, seeing the other family members, it means a lot,” Verdehyou said. “It’s nice to see (them), nice to be around a group you have something in common with.”
There were fewer than 50 people in attendance at the county memorial Monday, a far cry from the thousands who gathered to mourn the dead at San Manuel Stadium on Dec. 3, 2015.
“Private is better,” Verdehyou said. “I mean, thanks to everyone who comes down here to these things … but the group that’s here means more than the general public. You’re always welcome, the general public, but county family is county family.
“We don’t want balloons and fireworks,” Verdehyou said.
San Bernardino County facilities flew flags at half-mast Monday.
A bell-ringing ceremony at Cal State San Bernardino is scheduled for later in the day Monday. Five of the 14 people killed in the 2015 attack were CSUSB alumni.
The campus Peace Garden garden is a memorial located south of the university’s Chemical Sciences Building, which was created in memory of the alumni killed in the attack. As part of the ceremony, a bell will be rung 14 times to commemorate each victim.
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