CARBONDALE — Dr. Gary Bruce Kitching, the Carbondale man killed in a Vail bar shooting over the weekend, was remembered Tuesday by friends and family as an avid sportsman, mountain climber, family man and good neighbor.
“He was one of those guys who would be out bundled up on the river in the middle of winter doing his thing, which for a 70-year-old man was pretty awesome,” said Kirk Webb, assistant manager at Taylor Creek Fly Shop in Basalt. “He put us young guys to shame.”
Kitching died of multiple gunshot wounds when longtime Vail resident Richard “Rossi” Moreau, 63, opened fire in the Sandbar in West Vail around 7:30 p.m. Saturday. Three other people were injured in the shooting, including a 63-year-old man who was in critical but stable condition at a Denver hospital.
Moreau was advised on first-degree murder charges in Eagle County Court on Monday. He is being held without bond.
Kitching had reportedly gone to the bar to watch the college football game of his alma mater, the University of Southern California, on the big-screen TV.
A Colorado native, Kitching was a semi-retired radiologist practicing in southern California, and for the past several years was a part-time resident at River Valley Ranch in Carbondale with his longtime companion, Lani (Young) Kitching. According to a wedding announcement that appeared in the Glenwood Springs Post Independent, they were officially married on Jan. 8, 2008.
According to River Valley Ranch neighbors Bill Spence and his wife, Sue Edelstein, the Kitchings had planned to retire full time to Carbondale later this year.
Read the rest of this report and an obituary for Kitching at .
