By the time headlines settled on his name, Alex Jeffrey Pretti had been reduced to a symbol in a fight he never chose. Those who knew him in fluorescent hospital corridors remember the man who lingered in doorways after shifts, explaining lab results in plain language, holding the hands of people who had run out of words. He believed democracy wasn’t an abstract noun but a daily practice: showing up at meetings, signing his name to petitions, standing in crowds that asked the government to do better.
Now his absence sits beside the loss of Renee Nicole Good, their stories braided together in candlelight and public comment periods. Official reports will arrive eventually, wrapped in technical phrasing and legal caution. Long before then, neighbors will have decided whether to trust those words—or to trust the chill that runs through them every time a siren breaks the night.
