Salesi Tvivailala Katoa, 37, known as Lala, was shot and killed outside the Kings Lounge on Kensington Avenue in Salt Lake City on the late night of Tuesday, December 22, 2020. Katoa, described as a protective brother with a love of music, poetry and dance, had been inside the lounge with two others when an altercation began with a group that included 41-year-old Kasim Mumin Sheikh-Mumin. Reports say the conflict involved an attempted robbery over watches and that an associate of Katoa’s allegedly held two people at knifepoint while another assaulted Sheikh-Mumin. During the chaos a man from Sheikh-Mumin’s group fired, wounding people, and witnesses later heard eight to nine shots after Sheikh-Mumin is said to have picked up a gun and gone outside.

Officers found Katoa dead in the driver’s seat of a car outside the lounge with multiple gunshot wounds; investigators concluded he was trying to flee when shot. On December 26 police arrested Kasim Sheikh-Mumin and charged him with murder, five counts of discharging a firearm causing serious injury, and possession of a gun by a restricted person; he was booked and held without bail. Does anyone have information about Katoa, his companions that night, or witnesses who were at Kings Lounge that evening?