Matthew Jordan Hicks-Morris was a twenty-two-year-old resident of Springfield, Missouri, who tragically lost his life on March 15, 2020. Born in Columbus, Mississippi, he had moved to Missouri to be closer to his sister and had built a life there, working as a cook at HuHot Mongolian Grill. Known to his friends and family as a fun-loving and goofy individual, he had a passion for video games such as Assassin's Creed and God of War, and he enjoyed watching anime and shows like The Office.
On the night of his death, he was a customer inside a Kum & Go convenience store located on East Chestnut Expressway in Springfield, a routine stop that turned into the scene of a violent mass shooting.
The events unfolded late that Sunday evening when a gunman crashed his vehicle at the convenience store and entered the premises armed with a rifle and a pistol. The assailant opened fire on the people inside the store, fatally striking Matthew along with two other individuals: Troy Rapp, a store employee, and Shannon Perkins, another customer. The chaos prompted a swift response from the Springfield Police Department. When officers arrived at the scene, they were met with gunfire from the suspect. In the ensuing exchange, Officer Christopher Walsh was fatally wounded, and another officer sustained injuries but survived.
The investigation identified the shooter as thirty-one-year-old Joaquin S. Roman. Authorities later revealed that Roman had a history of mental health struggles and had expressed feelings of being disrespected and a desire to inflict pain on others prior to the attack. Following the shooting of the victims and the confrontation with police, Roman was found deceased inside the store from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Because the perpetrator died by suicide at the scene, there were no arrests made, and no criminal trial could be pursued. Police closed the case as a murder-suicide, noting that the firearms used in the attack had been legally purchased.
