As a gay man, Bob Stuhr appreciated that Laura Ann Carleton flew a rainbow flag outside her clothing business in Lake Arrowhead.
But as a businessman who runs a shop in the same strip mall a few doors down, Stuhr warned Carleton that the flag might not be good for business in the mountain community 80 miles east of Los Angeles.
“I told her when she put all those flags out there that as a business person, it’s probably not the best idea — because some flags trigger people,” Stuhr said.
But Carleton did not care, and she told Stuhr that bluntly.
“She said … ‘They don’t have to shop in my store.’”
But her decision to fly the pride flag outside her shop had fatal consequences, authorities said.
Carleton was shot and killed Friday by a man who first made “several disparaging remarks about a rainbow flag that stood outside the store,” San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department officials said in a news release.
When sheriff’s deputies arrived, they found Carleton, 66, suffering from a gunshot wound, authorities said. Paramedics pronounced her dead at the scene.
Laura Ann Carleton in an undated photo provided by daughter Ari Carleton.
Deputies said they found the man a few miles away and armed with a handgun after he fled on foot. During a confrontation, deputies shot and killed the suspect.
On Monday, officials identified the man as Travis Ikeguchi, 27.
Days later, the violence of Carleton’s killing — and the outpouring of support from residents, friends and supporters of the LGBTQ+ community — still cling to the scene of the crime.
A single bullet hole punctured the glass entrance to Carleton’s store, Mag.Pi, and solemnly greeted the cortège of mourners dropping off flowers and more rainbow flags.
Friends gathered at nearby stores and in the parking lot outside, crying and holding each other and sharing stories of Carleton, while they tried to wrap their heads around the loss of a…