Buena Vista resident remembered as ‘fun-loving, hardworking’ — Homicide victim Nathaniel Ware was visiting friends in Saginaw and stopped at a store on his way home, said a family member who spoke with police. Ware, 56, went inside The Food Basket at East Remington and South 15th to buy something late Wednesday, said his sister, Patricia Franklin-Lindsey, 51. Ware never made it to his Buena Vista Township home. Instead, he was shot about midnight while someone was trying to rob him, Ware’s younger sister said. Police arrived and found Ware inside his pearl-colored SUV, stopped on South 15th a few yards from the parking lot driveway. He was suffering from multiple gunshot wounds. Ware died a short time later at St. Mary’s of Michigan hospital. He is the city of Saginaw’s 22nd homicide victim this year. Police have not released additional details about his death but initially said there were no suspects. “It’s so unfortunate that in society today, you can’t even pull up to a store and be safe,” Franklin-Lindsey said. “It’s very scary to think you walk in, you walk out and you never get to get out of the parking lot.” Family and friends gathered at Ware’s home in Buena Vista, just east of the Saginaw city border, hours after his death. “Anybody would tell you — and we’ve had several people come through today — he was the type of person who would keep you laughing,” Franklin-Lindsey said. “He was a fun-loving, hardworking guy.” In the past, he worked at a General Motors plant in Saginaw and later at a Lincoln-Mercury dealership on Bay, Franklin-Lindsey said. Ware was receiving disability income at the time of his death. Ware had a lot of friends and family members in Saginaw and took care of his mother, Rennie Ware, Franklin-Lindsey said. “He was very easy to get along with,” she said, noting several family members and friends were at his house on the day of his death. “He was just a caring person.” Ware was not married and had no children, Franklin-Lindsey said. His mother and two sisters, Franklin-Lindsey and Debra Mason, survive him. The family is arranging the funeral with Evans and Browne’s Funeral Home in Saginaw. Ware was visiting a few friends on Saginaw’s East Side shortly before his death, Franklin-Lindsey said, and they told her they were having a good time and talking about old times. Shortly before midnight, he told his friends he was going to head to the store and then home, his sister said. Giselle Bender, 49, said she was a close friend of Ware’s for at least 20 years and described him as “warm-spirited and fun to be around.” Another close friend, April Williams, 45, said she saw Ware “every other day” and had spoken with him several times the day before his death, although she missed his last call to her phone about 11:30 p.m. “I didn’t answer,” she said, noting Ware was planning to come over to her house to go swimming that day, but it never happened. “I just feel sick. Maybe he would have came over,” she said. “If I would have gotten that call, maybe he would still be alive. He was my buddy.” She has many good memories of Ware. “He was funny. He was sweet and kind,” she said. “Anyone who made him mad, he would (joke and) say he was checking them off the list and they couldn’t get back on.” He liked cars and clothes, she said, noting he would talk about the pearl-colored SUV and had chrome placed on the side in the past few weeks. She guessed he was picking up cigarettes at the store before he was killed. She wondered, if he was robbed, why the thieves took his life. “Why can’t you just take his stuff and let him go?” she asked. The Saginaw Police Department and Michigan State Police are investigating Ware’s death. Anyone with information about the death is asked to call Crime Stoppers at 800-422-JAIL.

Source:  Saginaw News, August 24, 2013, By Brad Devereaux bdeverea@mlive.com SAGINAW