Twenty years ago on October 21, 1998, my brother Mark killed a man.

I think about it every October but more so this year, which marks a significant anniversary of that tragic event.

I still remember that Wednesday afternoon when I gave a ride to my older brother who lived here in Alamosa for about seven years. I had an interview for the paper that afternoon at La Llave on State Avenue. Mark waited in the car while I did the interview, and then I took him where he wanted to go.

Later that evening, as I was heating up some macaroni and cheese before heading to the Alamosa city council meeting, Mark and some friends showed up at my door, again wanting a ride. It would mean not having time for the mac and cheese and being a little late for city council, but I gave them a ride out to my brother’s trailer.

In the car with my brother that night was the man he would later stab to death at his fifth-wheel trailer in a trailer park on the west edge of Alamosa. I don’t think the man said anything while my brother and a woman that was with them chatted. They all had been drinking.

Sometime just before midnight an argument apparently occurred between the men, perhaps over the woman. My brother would say he reacted in self defense, but he was the only one with a weapon. His victim managed to stumble outside the trailer. He was pronounced dead at the hospital shortly after midnight, early Thursday morning.

Ironically, the man’s name was Steven King, like the famous author, who was one of my brother’s favorites (although spelled slightly differently.) He had no family here and was originally from Louisiana.

Although I had a phone call late that night from a neighbor who said my brother was in trouble, she did not say that he killed someone, and I figured that if he was in jail, he could stay there until morning, and if he was all right, I would see him on Thursday when I planned to pick him up to take in his aluminum cans for some cash.

I didn’t hear any more that night or the next morning, so I headed down to Capulin to interview a sweet lady for a feature story. It was there that a victim advocate from the sheriff’s office found me and told me I needed to go to the Alamosa County Sheriff’s Office. Everything from that point on was a numbing blur … visiting my brother briefly … hearing what had happened … going to my brother’s trailer to take care of his two dogs, whom I took care of until they found new homes the following year when my brother went to prison … touching blood on the trailer door as I left and realizing whose it was … calling my sisters … trying to contact my parents who were returning from a trip to the East Coast and couldn’t be reached (no cell phones between us then.) It was a good thing in retrospect, I think, that they didn’t find out until they came back to Denver the following day when they could be with my sisters to hear the news that they had feared hearing for many years, that their son had killed someone.

My brother had caused our family and many other people grief for many years. Without going into details, it was a burden and sorrow our family bore. Some of Mark’s problems are due to mental illness and some due to choices he has made. One of the poor choices he made that night was to drink, which led to the fight and the stabbing.

My brother’s case moved through the court system over the next several months. He was initially charged with second-degree murder. At his trial the following May he was convicted of manslaughter and later sentenced to only a few years in prison. He has been out for some time now and lives in another city in Colorado.

I love my brother, and I visited him almost every visitation day at the jail. I went to the court appearances, and I attended as much of the trial as I could, but I was called as a witness so was not allowed to go until it was my turn to speak. I was there for his sentencing, and I cared for his two dogs until they found new homes, as I couldn’t keep them because of conflict with my own dogs.

I loved my brother, but I also wanted justice for his victim. I think three years was not appropriately long enough for taking someone’s life, but that is the way our justice system works sometimes.

I still love my brother and pray for him every day, because I want him to know God still loves him, and I want him to accept that love.

I also fear my brother and have for most of my life. He is older now, in his 60’s, so he is not as much of a threat. He lives pretty quietly for the most part, with his dog, and he is not in good health. We don’t have much contact. Any contact with him is painful. His Christmas card to me last year was pretty hateful, so I cannot subject myself to that kind of treatment. My sisters had to distance themselves years ago, and my parents have to some extent, but parents’ love for their children, especially their only son, is strong, in spite of the pain those children might cause them.

As I remember that October, 20 years ago, my heart aches over the loss of a life and the effect that had on so many others’ lives.

At the time I mentioned a saying in my column that I had heard, “When I am happy, I sing to God. When I am sad, God sings to me.”

In that dark time, and many since, I have heard God singing.