Deseret News | Trolley shooter's father: 'We did not run away'

Trolley shooter's father: 'We did not run away'

By Emir Hodzic
Slobodna Bosna

Published: Tuesday, March 18, 2008 12:28 p.m. MDT

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Editor's note: The weekly news magazine Slobodna Bosna, located in Sarajevo, recently filed this report about the family of the Trolley Square killer, Sulejman Talovic. They had fled to Salt Lake City as refugees from the war that tore apart the former Yugoslavia in the early 1990s. On Feb. 12, 2007, 18-year-old Sulejman Talovic used a pistol and a shotgun to murder five and wound four others at Trolley Square, Salt Lake City. The parents briefly returned to their hometown of Talovici, Bosnia, in March 2007 for the burial of the man, who was shot by police to end his rampage. Recently the family, including daughters, went back to Bosnia. Slobodna Bosna had this update from the Tuzla region in the country's northeast area. The article was translated by Slobodna Bosna's Nedim Hasic and edited by Joe Bauman of the Deseret Morning News.

DUBNICA, Bosnia-Herzegovina — Talking to the Talovic family is almost "Mission: Impossible."

Neighbors claimed the family doesn't talk to anybody. Sabira Talovic, mother of Sulejman Talovic, doesn't leave the home. The same is true for the daughters, Medina, Fatima and Sanela.

When we arrived at the house, Sabira opened the door and said she does not want to talk to the media at all. A few moments later, her husband, Suljo Talovic, did speak with us.

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"We did not run away from the U.S.A.," he said. "Nobody said to us that we have to go. Nobody pushed out of Salt Lake City, and nobody threatened us or treated us badly.

"On the contrary, local people comforted us after the tragedy, they gave us consolation. We came back to Bosnia simply because this is the best place for us at the moment, for me, for my sick wife and for our children,"

Dubnica is a small village about 93 miles from the capital, Sarajevo. It is near the former Eagle Base, used by the U.S. Army during its peace-keeping operations in Bosnia. Many refugees from the eastern part of Bosnia have made new lives here.

The Talovics bought land with a ruined house, destroyed during the fighting of the 1990s. They are building a new home.

Suljo Talovic said he became a heavy smoker in the past year, since the Trolley Square shooting, smoking 30 or 40 cigarettes a day. He doesn't speak a lot. All he wants, he said, is to finally settle down and continue with his wife.

"This is not our final decision," he added. "We are still thinking about life in the United States. Someday, maybe, we will go back to the U.S.A. We will see.

"But my wife is very sick. She suffered a heart attack after our son committed the massacre, and I hope this will be a good place for her to get well."

He said that nobody in Salt Lake City judged the family because of what Sulejman did.

"Lots of people called us, and they offered help. We met with the mother of one of the victims. She called us and asked to see us, to talk to us. It was human conversation.