Towson U. Plans Memorial Vigil

Ryan Bailey had a promising future in business. Timothy Allan Coyer was a model soldier and an outgoing classmate.

Over the course of 24 hours on Saturday, the two students were dead, in separate tragedies that have stunned the campus.

The university will host a candlelight vigil for Bailey and Coyer at 8 p.m.  Tuesday at the Speaker's Circle (outside Hawkins Hall).

"I know a lot of people who are affected by this and it's just one of those sad crazy anomalies," said student government president Matt Sikorski. "When any student passes away, it always kind of hits you hard."

Bailey, 20,  in a hit-and-run incident while walking on York Road early Saturday morning.

Coyer, 27, by roommates in his apartment in the 7700 block of Greenview Terrace.

His body was taken to the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner for an autopsy. Police said the homicide unit was not called to the scene.

Coyer, an Army veteran and Stevensville native, served two deployments in Iraq. He enrolled at Towson last fall, following his discharge, and was a junior pre-business administration major. He was involved in the Kappa Sigma fraternity and the student veterans group on campus.

"He had a very extroverted personality, where some people are kind of reserved when it comes to promoting things," said Patrick Young, director of Towson's Veterans Center.

"He was all over the place if we were trying to promote an event that we're doing," Young said, adding that Coyer worked to help make ROTC students and others aware of veteran events.

"He always had a smile on his face," he said. "Tim was not on that list of people you think this could happen to."

According to a 2011 Towerlight article, Coyer spent some time studying biology at Salisbury University before he decided college wasn't for him. At 23, he enlisted, and was later stationed in Fort Hood, Texas.

Military service ran in Coyer's family. One of his brothers was even stationed with him at Fort Hood.

Coyer, a gunner, was twice deployed to Iraq. He told the student newspaper a story about how his unit was assigned to deliver food to Iraqi civilians. The children were not scared, but the soldiers faced hostile treatment from adults.

“The people would take the food given to them by us and throw it in ditches because they didn’t want us there,” Coyer told the paper.

Coyer's relatives could not immediately be reached.

"It's a very, very sad time," university spokeswoman Carol Dunsworth said Saturday. "I've been with the university 15 years and I cannot remember another weekend as tragic as this."