Remembering Our Dead

TDoR 2023 / 2022 / November / 19 / Daniel Davis Aston

Daniel Davis Aston

Age 28

19 Nov 2022
Colorado Springs (USA)
Shot

TDoR list ref: tgeu/tdor2023/19-Nov-2022/Daniel Davis Aston

Daniel was one of five people shot and killed (19 others being injured) in the Club Q shooting. Kelly Loving was also killed in the same attack.

Anderson Lee Aldrich, 22, was subdued by patrons and held for arrest by authorities. The suspected shooter is facing five counts of first-degree murder and five counts of a bias-motivated crime causing bodily injury.

A 28-year-old transgender bartender and entertainer has been identified as one of the five victims killed in the Colorado Springs shooting at Club Q. Daniel Aston, according to his mother Sabrina, gravitated toward the nightclub where the shooting unfolded late Saturday because "he liked helping the LGBT community."

"We are in shock, we cried for a little bit, but then you go through this phase where you are just kind of numb, and I’m sure it will hit us again," Aston told the Associated Press alongside her husband Jeff at their Colorado Springs home following Daniel’s death. "I keep thinking it’s a mistake, they made a mistake, and that he is really alive," she added.

Sabrina Aston said her son’s eagerness to make people laugh and cheer started as a child in Tulsa, Oklahoma, when he would don elaborate costumes such as the beast from "Beauty and the Beast." He would also cycle through weird hats and write plays acted out by neighborhood kids, she said.

Aston preferred dressing as a boy at a young age until teasing from other kids pushed him to try girls clothing. While Sabrina Aston enjoyed helping style her son, she said the fashion led to weight loss. "He was miserable," she said.

After coming out to his mother, he attended Northeastern State University in Tahlequah, Oklahoma, and became president of its LGBTQ club. Aston, the self-proclaimed "Master of Silly Business," put on fundraisers with flashy productions.

Two years ago, Aston moved from Tulsa to Colorado Springs -- where his parents had settled -- and started at Club Q as a bartender and entertainer. His parents would join in the cheers at his shows. "(Daniel’s shows) are great. Everybody needs to go see him," his mother said. "He lit up a room, always smiling, always happy and silly," she said.

Daniel's Facebook profile is https://www.facebook.com/danieldavis.aston.

https://web.archive.org/web20230626195745/https://www.seattlepi.com/news/article/suspect-set-to-plead-guilty-in-attack-that-killed-18170274.php

https://www.pentictonherald.ca/news/world_news/article_510fd307-0c1f-50d5-8194-4d39ae8211f7.html

https://www.cpr.org/2022/12/07/daniel-aston-who-lost-his-life-at-club-q-remembered-as-a-lover-of-everything-and-all/

https://www.advocate.com/crime/club-q-shooting-hearing

https://www.fox23.com/news/public-memorial-oklahoman-killed-club-q-shooting-held-all-souls-unitarian-church/TQC6ZE3STZAXLJALLX7QWCDUYA/

https://web.archive.org/web/20221217170811/https://okcfox.com/news/local/public-memorial-for-oklahoma-club-q-victim-at-all-souls-unitarian-church

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/kelseyweekman/colorado-shooting-club-q-suspect-charged-murder-hate-crime

https://www.outsmartmagazine.com/2022/12/it-happened-again/

https://time.com/6237513/colorado-springs-shooting-lgbtq-hate-speech/

https://wagingnonviolence.org/2022/12/club-q-how-do-we-stop-system-from-taking-more-trans-lives/

https://www.losangelesblade.com/2022/11/23/club-q-suspect-in-court-friend-says-never-claimed-to-be-nonbinary/