Friends of a man who was killed outside a York County restaurant early Thursday morning are holding a candlelight vigil in his honor Friday evening.
Richard Irvin, 42, was working as a security guard to help with crowd control at a tent party in the parking lot of the County Grill, at 1215 George Washington Memorial Highway, according to the York-Poquoson Sheriff’s Office. Irvin was shot and killed around 2 a.m. Thursday while escorting a man from the party, deputies said.
Irvin’s vigil will take place at 7 p.m. at the County Grill, according to Amy Thomas, a friend of Irvin’s who considered the man her brother.
Thomas said she knew Irvin for 17 years and that all his friends called him Bird. Irvin spent his time caring for his parents, his dog and his friends, according to Thomas.
His parents and Paddy, a bull terrier, were Irvin’s whole world, according to Thomas. She said Irvin and his mom would eat at Pop’s Drive-in in York every Monday, and Irvin would always invite friends to join them.
Every Tuesday, Irvin would cook dinner with Thomas. She said cooking was another passion of his.
“He’d blast Irish music and make everything homemade,” she said.
Thomas characterized Irvin as a big guy with a big heart and said she’d miss how caring he was for all people. “He was an amazing person; he’d do anything for anyone,” she said.
No one has been arrested in the shooting investigation, according to the Sheriff’s Office. On Thursday, authorities obtained warrants charging Coleston Ryan Lewis, 26, with murder and use of a firearm in commission of a felony.
Anyone with information on Lewis’s location is asked to call the Crime Line at 1-888-LOCK-U-UP or the Sheriff’s Office tip line at 757-890-4999.
