Friends and total strangers gathered Friday night at a Richardson bar to remember a bystander killed in a shooting at a Dallas Area Rapid Transit station.
Eric Johnson loved playing basketball for his Special Olympics team in Plano and going to the movies. He was on his way to meet a friend at a theater when he was killed.
Friends say Johnson's real passion was karaoke. They gathered to sing karaoke in his memory at Harbor Point, where he was a regular on Friday nights.
Johnson's best friend, Shay Allen, sang "I Believe I Can Fly." It was Johnson's favorite song to sing because he believed he could do anything, despite his disabilities.
Glenn Lukin runs the karaoke company Johnson followed around the Dallas area.
"He taught a lot of people that it doesn't matter that you have what other people consider a handicap -- you can get up and do what you want to do," he said.
Connie Lawson, Johnson's former fiancee, said she first fell in love with him on the karaoke stage.
"He got up on stage and sang to me and signed at the same time, and I just thought it was so romantic," she said.
While the two called off their marriage, they remained friends until the day he died.
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"He was just at the wrong place at the wrong time," Lawson said. Maybe it was God putting him there for a greater purpose."
Friends took up a collection in Johnson's memory.
They plan to give the money to his family to help pay for the funeral and donate the rest to the Special Olympics.
