By JACINDA HOWARD, The Mirror
The bright faces and frequent smiles of Brian and Beverly Mauck will be remembered by those in Federal Way and Des Moines, where the two were respectively raised.
The Federal Way Community Center was packed Saturday with friends, family and acquaintances who came to celebrate the short-lived lives of Brian and Beverly Mauck, who were violently killed in their Graham home on Nov. 17.
Brian, 30, and Beverly, 28, will be remembered and mourned by many.
“They lived life to the fullest,” Brian’s sister Jennifer Heilbrun said. “There was not anything that went undone.”
Questions remain:
While family and friends remember Brian and Beverly Mauck, questions about their deaths linger.
The couple was found shot to death three times, execution style, in their home Nov. 17, according to charging papers. The motive for the crime was not known at first.Later, after the Pierce County Sheriff’s Office questioned neighbor Daniel Tavares Jr., 41, several times, he admitted to killing the couple after Brian Mauck allegedly insulted him when Tavares came to the couple’s house Nov. 17 to collect a $50 debt, according to charging papers.
On Nov. 19, Tavares was arrested and booked into Pierce County jail without bond, said Jerry Costello, Chief Criminal Prosecuting Attorney. The following day, Tavares was arraigned and charged with two counts of aggravated first-degree murder and one charge of unlawful possession of a firearm in the slayings of the Maucks, according to charging papers.
Tavares remains jailed. Prosecutors have until Dec. 20 to decide if they will seek the death penalty.
However, prosecutors expect the defense to request more time to convince a judge that the case should not be tried as a capital case, Costello said. If the case is not tried as a capital case, the penalty for aggravated first-degree murder is life in prison, he said. It would not be the first time Tavares spent time in prison, nor would it be the first murder charge that got him there.
In June, Tavares had finished his more than 15-year prison term for the murder of his mother. But prosecutors requested he remain imprisoned based on allegations of assault on two prison guards. The request was approved by one Massachusetts judge and bail was set at $50,000. Then, Judge Kathe
Tuttman overturned that decision and Tavares was freed. He subsequently moved to Washington.
Heilbrun said her family has not wanted to think about the circumstances of Brian and Beverly’s deaths. She said she is not knowledgeable enough about previous charges against Tavares and the circumstances of his release to make an educated speculation on why he was allowed to leave the prison. But she wonders why Tavares was released from prison when he had a violent record.
“Obviously it’s senseless,” Heilbrun said about the deaths of her brother and sister-in-law.
Remembering loved ones:
Brian Mauck’s family has resided in the same house since he was in first grade. He attended Decatur High School where he played football and baseball, Heilbrun said. He then attended Pierce Community College before moving north to enroll at Western Washington University.
Prior to finishing his education at Western, Brian moved back to the Federal Way area and began a refrigeration apprenticeship before becoming a journeyman refrigeration technician with Emerald Aire in Auburn. Brian was goal-driven and ambitious, Heilbrun said.
“He would say something, then the next day it would be in the works,” she said.
He was known for his good nature and smile. Many of his close friends were people he befriended in high school, Heilbrun said. People who knew Brian in junior and senior high school — some who had not seen him in years — have left their memories of Brian posted at brianandbeverlymauck.com, a Web site dedicated to the couple after their passing.
“He had thousands of friends,” Heilbrun said.
In 2001, Brian met his match — Beverly. Like Brian, Beverly also grew up in the area and attended school in Des Moines. As a teenager, she worked at Pattison’s West Skating Center. There she got to know the Pattison family while reveling in her fervor for skating.
“She was always a happy, fun-loving kid and she was that way as an adult too,” Pattison’s co-owner Kay Pattison said.
Brian and Beverly celebrated their union in May 2006 when they were married. Together they enjoyed life. Scuba diving, traveling, motorcycle riding and the Seahawks were passions they shared, according to brianandbeverlymauck.com.
“They lived, they laughed and they loved,” Heilbrun said.
Brian is survived by his parents Al and Pam Mauck, his sister and brother-in-law Jennifer and Chris Heilbrun and nieces Gracie, 4, and Lexie, 21-months.
Beverly is survived by her mother, Karen Slater, and stepfather, Rick Nelson, her brother DJ Slater, and brother and sister-in-law Craig and JoAnn Slater.
Contact Jacinda Howard: jhoward@fedwaymirror.com or (253) 925-5565.
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Mitt Romney in the mix:
Former Massachusetts Governor and Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney appointed Kathe Tuttman to her seat as a Superior Court judge in Massachusetts. He asked her to resign from that position Saturday in light of the Mauck murders and what he called a bad judgement, according to a Nov. 24 The Associated Press article titled “Romney: Judge he appointed should resign.”
In what has turned into a political frenzy, vying Republican presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani has referenced the case as a demonstration of Romney’s bad record against crime, according to the same article.
