Jesse Vernon Musser was 88 when he was killed on March 29, 2009, during the Carthage nursing home shooting at Pinelake Health and Rehabilitation Center in Carthage, North Carolina. A retired railroad mechanic, he had worked 41 years with the Virginian Railroad and Mullens Machine Shop. Musser was also known as a woodworker and gunsmith, and had moved to Carthage in 2003 with his wife, Melba, to be nearer their daughter, Holly.

On the night of the shooting staff normally took Musser to visit his wife, who suffered from Alzheimer’s, but no visit occurred that night. The next day the family told Melba her husband had died peacefully in his sleep. The gunman, Robert Kenneth Stewart, opened fire at the facility, killing eight people including Musser and wounding a ninth; Stewart was arrested and charged in connection with the attack.

Did anyone in the community know Jesse, his work as a woodworker or gunsmith, or have information about that night at the facility?