In the early evening hours of November 6, 2020, a violent encounter in a hotel parking lot in Midvale, Utah, left 39-year-old Teresa Marie Alires, a White/Caucasian female from Salt Lake City, dead from a gunshot wound. The events that culminated in her death unfolded outside the Tru by Hilton hotel, adjacent to a bustling WinCo Foods grocery store. Initial calls to the Unified Police Department around 5:30 p.m.
reported an assault with a weapon, quickly followed by multiple reports of shots fired.
Upon their arrival, officers discovered Alires deceased in the hotel parking lot. A second individual, a 36-year-old man named Tyler Wade Shirreffs, was found inside the nearby WinCo, seriously injured with multiple gunshot wounds. Employees at the store had fashioned makeshift tourniquets to aid him before police and paramedics arrived. He was subsequently transported to a local hospital in serious condition.
Investigations revealed a complex and volatile relationship between Alires and Shirreffs. According to a search warrant affidavit, Shirreffs' girlfriend had recently ended her relationship with him and had begun a new one with Alires, suggesting a possible love triangle as a motive. The situation was further complicated by allegations of drug activities. Text messages from Alires to Shirreffs' girlfriend reportedly contained threats to harm Shirreffs. On the evening of the shooting, Shirreffs and his girlfriend were in a white 2005 Cadillac CTS in the hotel parking lot when Alires approached. It is reported that Alires brandished a handgun, demanded money from Shirreffs, and then shot him multiple times. A struggle for the weapon ensued, during which Shirreffs managed to take the gun from Alires and shot her.
Following his release from the hospital, Tyler Wade Shirreffs, who was a parole fugitive at the time of the incident, was returned to the Utah State Prison on a parole violation. However, no criminal charges were filed against him in direct connection with the shooting death of Teresa Marie Alires. In the immediate aftermath, police sought to identify and speak with a man and a woman seen leaving the area on foot, as well as the occupants of the white Cadillac that left the scene. No other suspects have been publicly identified or arrested in connection with the incident. A weapon was recovered at the scene, though it was not immediately clear if other firearms were involved.
