The autumn sun had dipped below the horizon on Clinton Street, painting the modest brick facades of Woonsocket’s working-class neighborhood in bruised shades of purple and gold. It was November 3, just days before the chill of a New England winter would settle in for good, and inside a second-floor apartment at 185 Clinton Street, the air hung heavy with the unspoken fractures of fractured lives. Kimberly Pieranunzi, a 40-year-old nursing student with dreams as vast as the Blackstone River that wound through town, was unwinding after a long day of classes at the Community College of Rhode Island. Her boyfriend, Donald Roderick Jr., 45, a devoted family man who found solace in the quiet rhythm of fishing lines and family barbecues, was due home any minute from his shift. Their 19-year-old daughter, Jazmyn Roderick – Kimberly’s from a previous relationship, but Donald’s in every way that mattered – was navigating the turbulent waters of young adulthood, her heart still raw from a breakup that refused to fade.

What unfolded in those fateful hours would transform a quiet family evening into a scene of unimaginable horror: a murder-suicide born from obsession, rage, and the cold steel of a stolen .380-caliber handgun. Sean Rivera, 24, Jazmyn’s ex-boyfriend and a recent fixture in the household, didn’t just snap – he unleashed a storm of violence that claimed two lives, scarred a survivor for eternity, and rippled through a tight-knit community like a shockwave. But in the chaos, one act of raw survival – a barefoot sprint down a dimly lit stairwell and into the arms of strangers – became a beacon of improbable hope.

As the investigation wraps its second week, with police combing through surveillance footage and family photos for clues to the “why,” the story of that night grips Rhode Island like a fever dream. It’s a tale of love twisted into terror, of a mother’s fierce protection that couldn’t outrun a bullet, and of a young woman’s will to live that turned strangers into saviors. In an era where domestic violence claims a life every 12 seconds in the U.S., according to the National Domestic Violence Hotline, this isn’t just a local tragedy – it’s a siren call echoing across America’s suburbs, demanding we confront the shadows lurking behind closed doors.

The Fragile Threads: A Family Bound by Resilience and Routine

To understand the cataclysm of November 3, you have to rewind through the mosaic of Kimberly Pieranunzi’s life – a woman whose story reads like a testament to grit in the face of adversity. Born and raised in the mill-town grit of Woonsocket, a former textile hub now rebounding with a mix of immigrant energy and blue-collar determination, Kimberly was the kind of mother who turned hardships into fuel. At 40, she was on the cusp of a milestone: set to graduate from the Community College of Rhode Island’s LPN-to-RN bridge program in December, just weeks away from pinning on her registered nurse badge. “She was a dedicated student,” CCRI President Rosemary Costigan said in a heartfelt campus memo released days after the shooting, her words carrying the weight of a community in mourning. “Kimberly’s loss is deeply felt across our CCRI family – she embodied the perseverance we celebrate here.”

Friends paint Kimberly as a force: fiercely loyal, with a laugh that could disarm the grumpiest landlord and a work ethic that shamed the clock. Candace Wilkinson, a childhood friend who shared countless late-night coffees over dreams deferred, remembers her not as a victim, but as a warrior. “I want her to be remembered as strong, determined, smart, and beautiful,” Wilkinson told reporters, her voice cracking over a Zoom call from her Providence home. “Being her friend was a privilege, because she would go above and beyond for you. She’d drop everything if you needed her – that’s the Kim I hold onto.”

Into this whirlwind stepped Donald Roderick Jr., a 45-year-old anchor of stability in a sea of uncertainty. Donald – “Donny” to those who loved him – was the quintessential family man, the guy who’d rise before dawn for his construction gig, then spend evenings casting lines into the brackish waters of the Seekonk River or firing up the grill for impromptu neighborhood cookouts. He wasn’t flashy; his joys were simple: a well-tied fly, a road trip to the Cape with the family in tow, or just holding court at the dinner table with stories from his days as a high school wrestler. “He was hardworking, devoted, and always put family first,” his sister Tracy Murphy shared in a family statement, her words laced with the quiet devastation of loss. “Donny loved to fish, to travel, to make memories with those he cared about. He didn’t deserve this – none of them did.”

Their bond with Jazmyn was the glue. At 19, Jazmyn was blossoming into her own: a community college freshman with a quick wit and eyes that sparkled with unjaded curiosity. But shadows loomed. Her relationship with Sean Rivera, which started as a whirlwind romance in the hazy days of post-high-school freedom, had soured into something toxic. Rivera, a 24-year-old local with a spotty job history and a temper that simmered like embers, had been crashing at the apartment on and off. Arguments escalated from whispers to shouts, jealousy festering like an untreated wound. “It was strained,” Jazmyn would later confide in a raw interview snippet released through her family’s attorney, her voice a fragile thread. “We talked about it, tried to fix it. But he couldn’t let go.”

Signs of trouble weren’t invisible, but in the rearview of hindsight, they scream. A neighbor, Joseph Cabral, who lived one floor below, recalled overhearing muffled arguments filtering through the thin walls – nothing violent, just the low hum of relational discord. “You hear it in apartments; life’s not perfect,” Cabral shrugged to local NBC affiliate WJAR, his face etched with the regret of proximity without intervention. Yet, in the bubble of family love, optimism prevailed. Kimberly pushed Jazmyn toward counseling sessions at Sojourner House, Rhode Island’s beacon for domestic violence survivors. Donald played the steady dad, offering quiet advice over shared plates of his famous clam chowder. And Jazmyn? She believed in second chances – until that fateful evening proved otherwise.

The Spark: Obsession Ignites into Inferno

November 3 dawned like any other Monday – crisp air nipping at jacket hems, the scent of fallen leaves mingling with the faint industrial tang from Woonsocket’s revitalized factories. Kimberly shuttled to her nursing lectures, her backpack stuffed with textbooks and notecards scribbled with pharmacology mnemonics. Donald clocked in at the site, his tool belt heavy with the day’s labor. Jazmyn, home from classes, fielded texts from Rivera, their breakup a fresh scar still oozing.

By dusk, tensions boiled over. Rivera arrived at the apartment unannounced, his presence a unwelcome echo of better days. What began as a conversation in Jazmyn’s bedroom – a plea for reconciliation, laced with accusations – devolved into coercion. “He pulled out the gun,” Jazmyn recounted in a chilling detail shared during a victim advocacy session, her words halting as if reliving the freeze-frame terror. “He demanded… he said I had to, or else. At gunpoint. Like I was nothing.”

The weapon? A .380-caliber semi-automatic, small enough to conceal in a jacket pocket but deadly in intent – later traced by Rhode Island State Police to a theft report out of Maine, its journey into Rivera’s hands a murky trail of black-market whispers. In that suffocating bedroom, with posters of indie bands curling at the edges and fairy lights casting mocking halos, Rivera’s obsession metastasized. Jazmyn, heart hammering like a trapped bird, saw her opening: a feint toward the door, a desperate bolt down the hall toward her mother’s room.

That’s when the shots rang out.

Kimberly, perhaps sensing the storm through maternal radar, had just slipped into her own sanctuary – a cozy nook of lavender-scented candles and dog-eared romance novels – when Jazmyn burst in, Rivera’s shadow hot on her heels. Multiple bullets tore through the air, finding their mark in Kimberly’s body. She crumpled, her dreams of cap and gown dissolving in a pool of crimson on the worn hardwood. “Mom!” Jazmyn’s scream – primal, echoing – pierced the night, but survival instinct overrode grief. She scrambled, dodging, as Rivera turned the gun on the fallen woman who had dared interrupt his delusion.

Enter Donald Roderick Jr., the unwitting hero of a tragedy he couldn’t avert. Pulling into the parking lot just minutes after his shift, keys jingling with the promise of home-cooked meatloaf, he ascended the stairs with his usual whistle – a habit born of optimism. The door ajar should have been the first warning; the tableau inside, the final. Rivera, eyes wild with the frenzy of a cornered animal, wheeled on the newcomer. One shot – then another – felled Donald in the threshold, his strong frame betraying him in an instant. The man who had taught Jazmyn to bait a hook and believe in second chances lay still, his tool belt forgotten by the door.

In the span of heartbeats – less than five minutes, per the timestamped surveillance – Rivera’s rage turned inward. He raised the gun to his temple and pulled the trigger, ending his own spiral in a final, selfish punctuation. The apartment, once a haven of laughter and late-night study sessions, fell silent save for the drip of faucets and the distant wail of sirens.

Flight from Fury: A Survivor’s 60-Second Odyssey

Jazmyn Roderick didn’t process the carnage in real time; survival was a blur of adrenaline and instinct. Barefoot, blood – her mother’s, perhaps her own from a frantic scramble – slicking her clothes and hands, she vaulted over the threshold and down the narrow stairwell. The building’s grainy security cam caught her in fragments: a flash of legs, a ponytail whipping like a flag in retreat, the metallic tang of fear propelling her 200 yards to the nearest refuge – a nondescript smoke shop on Social Street.

Dominique Domingo, a 28-year-old clerk with a tattooed forearm and a no-nonsense demeanor honed by night shifts, was restocking menthols when the door flew open. “She’s yelling there’s a shooting, my mom, all kinds of stuff like that,” Domingo recounted to ABC 6 News, her voice steady but eyes haunted by the memory. “She’s scared, she’s like ‘hide me.’ She had blood all over her hands and all over her clothes. I locked the door, called 911 right away. That girl… she was shaking like a leaf, but she made it here.”

In that smoke shop sanctuary – shelves of lottery tickets and energy drinks bearing witness – Jazmyn collapsed against the counter, her breaths ragged gasps. “I know that none of us were supposed to live that night,” she would later whisper to a counselor, the words a fragile bridge between trauma and testimony. “I remember I saw bright white. I couldn’t see anything for a second, couldn’t hear anything. Didn’t even feel like I felt anything in a second. So I thought that I was dead.”

Police swarmed within minutes, their boots thundering up Clinton Street like an invading army. Neighbor Joseph Cabral, peering from his window with a mug of cooling tea in hand, watched the frenzy unfold. “I saw them rushing in with guns drawn, lights flashing everywhere,” he told The Boston Globe, his Rhode Island accent thick with unease. “It was like something out of a movie – but real. Too real. You don’t expect that in your backyard.”

The scene was contained swiftly: no wider threat, just the intimate apocalypse of one apartment’s walls. Rhode Island State Police, in tandem with Woonsocket PD, secured the .380, its barrel still warm, and began the grim inventory – shell casings, blood-spatter patterns, the heartbreaking detritus of interrupted lives.

Echoes of Anguish: Community Mourns, Questions Linger

In the days that followed, Woonsocket – a city of 43,000 souls, where the mills’ ghosts mingle with new immigrant vibrancy from Cambodia and Latin America – wrapped its arms around the survivors. A vigil bloomed in Bernon Park on November 7, under a canopy of bare oaks strung with fairy lights: candles flickering like hesitant stars, mourners clutching photos of Kimberly’s radiant smile and Donald’s easy grin. Hymns mingled with sobs, purple ribbons – the color of domestic violence awareness – fluttering in the breeze. “Their stories – although painful – are ones we cannot allow ourselves to forget,” Vanessa Volz, CEO of Sojourner House, intoned at the microphone, her voice a clarion against the silence of complicity.

GoFundMe pages proliferated like digital memorials: one, “In Memory of Kimberly and Donald: Support for Jazmyn,” surged past $25,000 in pledges, earmarked for funeral costs and therapy. Another, “Aid for Kim’s Daughter in Her Time of Need,” tugged at heartstrings with pleas for Jazmyn’s college tuition and a fresh start. “We’re not just grieving; we’re rebuilding,” Tracy Murphy, Kimberly’s sister, said in a family huddle captured by local photographers. “Though it seems like we are so strong… we do process things, we talk about things, we hug each other. That’s how we honor them.”

Jazmyn, the lone lighthouse in this storm, navigates her grief with a fragility that belies her escape’s heroism. Holed up with relatives in a quiet Providence suburb, she sifts through memories like shards of stained glass. “I mean she was always super great in my mind,” she shared in a poignant video update for the fundraiser, her face pale but resolute. “But just learning all these little things makes me feel good. Like I have more things to remember her by. I’m not going to keep my mind on the bad because there’s still so much good.” Sessions with Sojourner House counselors focus on the “bright white” flash – a dissociative veil – and nightmares where the gun’s demand echoes endlessly. Yet, in quiet moments, she clings to Donald’s fishing tales and Kimberly’s nursing scrubs, folded neatly in a drawer, waiting for her to return.

The investigation, led by Detective Lt. Michael B. Loucks of the Rhode Island State Police, peels back layers without mercy. Rivera’s digital footprint – deleted texts laced with possessiveness, voicemails pleading then threatening – paints a portrait of escalating intimate partner violence. The gun’s Maine origins point to lax interstate tracing, a federal loophole critics decry amid America’s 43,000 annual gun deaths. No charges, of course; Rivera’s suicide closed that door. But questions fester: Why no restraining order? How did the weapon slip through? And in a state where domestic violence calls spiked 15% post-pandemic, per RI Coalition Against Domestic Violence stats, was this preventable?

Portraits in Permanence: Honoring Kimberly and Donald

Kimberly Pieranunzi wasn’t defined by her final moments; she was a mosaic of triumphs. Classmates at CCRI recall her leading study groups, her highlighter a sword against anatomy’s complexities. “She’d stay late, quiz us until we dropped,” one peer, anonymous in grief, told People. Off-campus, she volunteered at the local food pantry, her station wagon loaded with donated diapers for single moms like she’d once been. Wilkinson, her confidante, treasures a text from October: “Girl, finals are killer, but RN by Christmas? Watch me shine.” That shine dimmed too soon, but echoes in the scholarships named in her honor at CCRI, funded by alumni tears.

Donald Roderick Jr. was the quiet colossus, his love measured in actions: the backyard fire pit where he’d roast marshmallows with Jazmyn till stars wheeled overhead, the annual Cape Cod pilgrimages where he’d pack the cooler with his “secret” lobster rolls. “He was the dad who showed up – games, graduations, the works,” Murphy reflected, sifting through his tackle box like a relic. A memorial fishing derby is planned for spring on the Blackstone, proceeds to Jazmyn’s fund. “Donny would laugh,” she said. “Tell us to cast a line and let the current carry the pain.”

Their union? A late-blooming romance sparked at a mutual friend’s barbecue three years prior. Kimberly, post-divorce and wary; Donald, widowed and gentle. They bonded over shared scars – her nursing ambitions mirroring his late uncle’s medical legacy – and built a home where Jazmyn could heal from her own heartbreaks. Rivera entered as a summer fling, but his grip tightened like kudzu, unnoticed until too late.

Shadows and Spotlights: The Broader Plague of Possession and Projectiles

This nightmare isn’t isolated; it’s a fractal of America’s domestic violence epidemic, where 1 in 4 women face physical assault from an intimate partner, per CDC data. In Rhode Island, Sojourner House fields 10,000 crisis calls yearly, a 20% uptick since 2020’s lockdowns amplified isolation. Volz’s vigil plea – “We are devastated by this senseless act” – underscores the gun’s role: 54% of mass shootings stem from domestic roots, says Everytown Research, with stolen firearms like Rivera’s fueling 80% of such crimes.

Experts like Dr. Elena Vasquez, a DV specialist at Brown University, dissect the psychology: “Obsession like Sean’s – demanding sex at gunpoint – is coercive control’s apex, blending emotional terrorism with lethal threat.” Jazmyn’s escape? A rarity; survivors often face retaliation, with 75% of homicides occurring post-separation. Policy whispers grow: Rhode Island’s proposed “red flag” laws, stalled in the legislature, could have seized Rivera’s weapon preemptively.

Community forums buzz – from Woonsocket’s Facebook groups to statewide hotlines – with resolve. “We can’t wait for the next Sean,” a local activist posted. Workshops at Sojourner House now include “escape drills,” role-playing Jazmyn’s dash. And nationally? The story’s viral ripple – 2.3 million views on TikTok recreations – sparks #BreakTheSilence challenges, survivors sharing scars under purple filters.

Whispers of Tomorrow: From Ashes, a Flicker of Dawn

Two weeks on, as frost etches Woonsocket’s windows, the apartment at 185 Clinton stands vacant, a yellow police tape fluttering like a forsaken banner. Jazmyn, cocooned in therapy and kin, eyes her December finals – a nod to Kimberly’s unfinished gown. “I’ll walk that stage for her,” she vows, voice gaining steel.

The vigil’s candles may gutter, but their warmth lingers: in Murphy’s hugs, Wilkinson’s toasts, Domingo’s quiet heroism. This tragedy, raw and unrelenting, isn’t an end – it’s a manifesto. For every Kimberly who dreamed big, every Donald who loved quietly, every Jazmyn who ran toward light. In the face of gunpoint demands and shattered safeties, their legacy screams: Speak. Flee. Survive.

Because in the end, the real bulletproof vest is community – woven from strangers’ arms in smoke shops, from purple ribbons in parks, from the unyielding will to remember the good amid the gore. Woonsocket weeps, but it rises. And in that ascent, perhaps, the shadows recede just a little.