Mount Tahoma High grieving death of student, football player Veron Lockett
.jpg "Veron Lockett, a junior at Mount Tahoma and player on the football team, died from a shooting in Tacoma on Sunday, April 20, 2025.")
Mount Tahoma High School’s community is grieving the loss of Veron Lockett, a teenager who was the victim of a fatal shooting on Sunday night in the Salishan area of Tacoma.
He was a junior and a football player at Mount Tahoma, who played receiver on offense and strong safety and outside linebacker on defense for the T-Birds last fall.
“Just a really good kid,” Mount Tahoma football head coach Keith Terry told The News Tribune by phone on Tuesday evening. “Just kind of finding a way to be successful. Finding ways to fight through adversity, to be better — that’s really the best way I could describe him.
“He was a fighter. He was relentless in his approach to be a better athlete and trying to be successful.”
The News Tribune previously reported officers responded to the 1700 block of East 41st Street just before 9:30 p.m. Sunday for reports of gunfire and found a boy who appeared to have been shot. Officers immediately began life-saving measures. Tacoma Fire Department personnel arrived soon after and took the boy to a local hospital, but he did not survive.
No arrests have been made, and detectives and crime-scene technicians are investigating the incident as a homicide, according to a Police Department news release.
Terry will remember Lockett’s energy.
“He has this smile about him,” Terry said. “Just the way he carried himself. … He was a goofy kid. Never took anything too serious, always found the bright spot in anything he was doing.”
Terry said Lockett played a part in Mount Tahoma’s state tournament loss to O’Dea, making some key defensive plays in the second half. Terry, alongside Mount Tahoma athletic director Rhonda Stinson and the rest of the school’s administration, are trying to hold everything together.
“We’ve done some things at the school trying to help the kids open up,” Terry said. “Just being at the school, helping them talk a little bit. Remembering the good times, processing it as a group.”
There will be a candle-light vigil at Mount Tahoma High School’s football stadium on Tuesday, April 22, from 8 to 8:14 pm, named “14 minutes for #14.”
