Unity mother reflects on 'the worst 4 months of my life' as probe into daughter's killing stalls

Bruna Vesco Leonard had a few video chats with her 25-year-old daughter on the evening of June 9.

Brianna Lartz was visiting a friend in Jeannette, and they were getting ready to eat dinner. Hours later, Leonard was panicked to hear about a shooting at the friend’s home.

Leonard said she tried to reach her daughter again after 10 p.m., “praying she would answer.”

But Lartz didn’t.

Leonard raced from her Unity home to Jeannette that night to find out her daughter was killed at the friend’s Lowry Avenue place. Four others were wounded in the gunfire. Leonard has been waiting four months for someone to be held accountable in her daughter’s death.

“I love her and I miss her every day,” Leonard said. “This has been the worst four months of my life.”

Westmoreland County detectives are still investigating. They are facing uncooperative witnesses and waiting on the results of DNA and other evidence, said Melanie Jones, spokeswoman at the District Attorney’s Office.

At the time of the shooting, authorities said they wanted to talk to two men who might have information — a man who has yet to be identified and Deshawn Russell, 26. Jones said the man who has yet to be identified “was not critical in the actual shooting investigation.”

They’re still looking for Russell, who has a bench warrant out for his arrest in connection with a gun violation in Fayette County.

Life has changed dramatically for the family of Lartz, who also lived in Jeannette and graduated from Greater Latrobe. Her parents now share custody of her 3-year-old son, while her 5-year-old son lives with his father.

“It’s just hard trying to deal with the loss of her and thinking about the kids,” Leonard said.

She’s tried to be patient for the last four months, but it hasn’t been easy.

“I’m agitated because I want everything done,” Leonard said. “I don’t like to wait.”

Lartz liked to cook, experimenting with different recipes and sometimes hosting family for the holidays.

“She made the best greens,” her mother said.

Leonard keeps her daughter’s ashes in a red urn and wears a small amount of them in a heart-shaped necklace with a red stone. Red was Lartz’s favorite color.

Leonard believes in the justice system and hopes her daughter’s killer ends up in it one day — “I want them to suffer like I’m suffering.”

“I know she’s gone but I can’t bring myself to accept it,” she said. “There’s days that I can’t stop crying and there’s days that I’m happy, that I think about all the good times we had together.”

Anyone with information on the shooting, the unidentified man or Russell’s whereabouts can contact county detectives at 724-830-3287.