PARKER - A friend of the man who police believe shot and killed his ex-wife in a McDonald's parking lot Tuesday night says he is in "utter shock" that Mark Royer would hurt anyone.
Royer was a minister who helped drug addicts, like Mark Wonder, turn their lives around.
Wonder says he has known Royer for almost a decade. Wonder credits Royer with saving his life from a methamphetamine addiction.
"It's just shocking. You just don't know what's happening in someone's life," Wonder said.
Wonder says Royer helped dozens of people get off drugs and even sponsored events for recovering drug addicts.
"As a minister he would always tell me, you don't need to do this. The sad part is there are also people that he affected in a positive way," Wonder said.
As Royer helped others turn their lives around, court records show his own life was spiraling out of control.
Royer had a restraining order previously filed against him following several harassment incidents.
Parker Police say Donna Royer, 40, was fatally shot at the McDonald's on South Parker Road and Main Street at about 5 p.m. on Tuesday night.
She was taken to the hospital where she later died.
After the incident, officers say they were looking for Mark Royer, Donna's ex-husband, as a person of interest in the case. His truck was found a short time after the shooting in a field near South Parker Road and Bayou Gulch in unincorporated Douglas County. His body was found in the open space near his truck. The Douglas County Coroner says he died from a self-inflicted gunshot to the head.
According to court documents, Donna Royer filed for a permanent restraining order against her ex-husband Mark Royer in April 2010. They divorced in early 2010. She then told the court to cancel the order.
The restraining order paperwork says Mark Royer harassed Donna Royer and her new boyfriend at a Starbucks in Denver on March 31, 2010. She says her estranged husband berated her and her boyfriend, so they left the store. Court documents say after Donna Royer and her boyfriend left, Mark Royer called her cellphone repeatedly, saying her boyfriend's mother would "mourn the loss of her son," and calling her a "pathetic piece of s**t."
Mark Royer then allegedly sent Donna two emails - one after the incident on March 31 that she described as "taunting," and one on April 1, 2010 using the biblical verses Proverbs 6 and 7 to describe what Donna says Mark Royer was going to do to her boyfriend. The court documents say the verses refer to "an arrow piercing the liver" and "revenge."
The restraining order paperwork says Donna Royer received a phone call on April 1, 2010, where Mark told her "her life would never be normal, and [she] had brought this on herself."
Donna Royer described the harassment incidents as one of many she had experienced with her ex-husband.
"His demeanor and affect has changed significantly, and he had become more threatening," she wrote in the restraining order paperwork. "I have had to block him several times by phone and email due to his behavior, but this makes it difficult to communicate regarding our two children. I fear it is just an escalation of his behavior."
Mark Royer is listed as president of a local church "Renewed Hope Ministries." Donna Royer was listed as the vice president.
Sgt. Doreen Jokerst says Donna Royer's two daughters were inside the McDonald's when the shooting happened outside in the parking lot near a snow bank. The children were not injured and were placed in police custody.
Police originally reported Donna Royer's had three children at the scene on Tuesday night. Officers now say she only had two children.
Parker Police say they have one record of an incident between Mark and Donna Royer. On Dec. 14, 2010, Donna Royer went to a police station to talk to an officer about harassing text messages from her estranged husband. Officers investigated the incident and decided that no criminal activity occurred. At the time, there was no restraining order in place.
A Facebook page has been created in memory of Donna Royer.
The University of Colorado School of Medicine says Mark Royer was a former senior professional research assistant at in the Department of Psychiatry. They say he resigned from CU on Aug. 31. He had been with the school since Nov. 10, 2000.
The CU medical school says Mark Royer worked as an outreach supervisor and project manager at the Project Safe Program, which is a research program within the Division of Substance Dependence in the psychiatry department. They say he dealt with research concerning public health and drug abuse, and focused on ways to prevent HIV and drug abuse from a behavioral standpoint.
A fund has been set up for the Royer's children. Police say donations can be made at any Wells Fargo branch to the "Memorial Fund for Donna Royer's Children."
(KUSA-TV © 2011 Multimedia Holdings Corporation)
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