WEST VALLEY CITY, Utah — Out at Centennial Park, the home of the annual WestFest celebration, there were no remnants Monday of the tragedy that unfolded on the festival's final night. However, the shooting late Sunday that left three people dead, including an infant, continues to weigh heavily on the West Valley City community.
“I used to love coming here and I just... it’s not fun anymore,” said Lexi Touhuni, who grew up in the area.
Just before we spoke with Touhuni, she shared how she was driving by the festival grounds, thinking about how the WestFest she once knew is no longer the same.
“We would come and watch the fireworks," she remembered. "We would sit over here by the pool all the time, and I never felt unsafe as a kid.”
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But several years have passed since she last walked the festival grounds.
“I used to come here all the time, but I haven’t been here in the past 3 years just because every year something crazy has happened,” Touhuni explained.
Carlos Marroquin attended WestFest for the first time with his wife and daughter last night. They returned to the festival grounds this afternoon to collect the belongings they had left behind in a rush.
“I thought it was fireworks," Marroquin said of the shooting, "and I turned around and see a bunch of people starting to run around.
“It was crazy, everything happened so fast. It could’ve been my daughter, it could’ve been someone else’s daughter.”
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Touhuni is unsure if she’ll ever return to the festival she once looked forward to every year.
“I don’t know if we need more security, more police officers, the whole highway patrolmen, everyone to come and be back up here.
"It’s where people come to have fun with their families and to play games and to create memories, and it just seems like you can’t do that anymore.”
