San Diego State University’s Independent Student Newspaper Since 1913

The Daily Aztec

San Diego State University’s Independent Student Newspaper Since 1913

The Daily Aztec




San Diego State University’s Independent Student Newspaper Since 1913

The Daily Aztec

Student murdered days before graduating

Photo courtesy of Lourdes Frame

While most students were preparing for their last finals and some even preparing to graduate, a murder-suicide occurred on the morning of Dec. 10.

According to the San Diego Police Department, Michel David, 22, a San Diego State journalism student who was a week short of graduating, was allegedly shot multiple times by her ex-boyfriend, former SDSU student Daniel Shoemake.

Shoemake, 21, later took his own life with a handgun.

According to SDPD, the murder-suicide took place near 55th Street and El Cajon Boulevard. David exited her apartment complex near College Area to walk her dog around 10 a.m., when Shoemake shot her multiple times with the assault rifle found near her body.

Shoemake then shot himself in his silver pickup truck, according to police and the San Diego County Medical Examiner’s Office.

According to Kiza Chapman, David’s coworker at The Cheesecake Factory in Chula Vista, the two met three years ago in Pleasanton, a suburb east of San Francisco, and moved to San Diego to attend college.

“He was too obsessed with her,” Chapman said. “He often said that if he couldn’t have her no one else could.”

According to Chapman, Shoemake was a member of the United States military and had problems with alcohol abuse that led him to check into rehab early last year.

David’s funeral took place in Pleasanton a week after her death, where both David and Shoemake were raised.

Lourdes Frame, a close friend of David’s, said hundreds of David’s friends remembered her in an emotional candlelight vigil in front of her apartment complex here in San Diego.

“There was not a dry eye in the crowd,” Frame said. “I will always remember her as one of the kindest and most loving people I met in San Diego.”

Frame also noted David’s relationship with Shoemake, after their breakup.

“Michel was the kind of girl that would never turn her back on anyone, she was just so loving and never had problems with anyone,” Frame said. “She even maintained a friendship with Dan, even after they broke up about a year ago.”

Frame, who is still in shock from the occurrence, was left with no bad memories of her good friend, and believes that every person who met David would feels the same way.

“I will never forget her,” Chapman said. “You just don’t meet people like Michel these days.”

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San Diego State University’s Independent Student Newspaper Since 1913
Student murdered days before graduating