When Kimberly Laurence saw her friend’s booking photo Wednesday morning she was in utter shock.
She had heard about the attempted bank robbery on Tuesday, where a SWAT team sniper shot and killed a man threatening hostages at knifepoint.
But she didn’t know until later that investigators said her friend, 36-year-old Sterling Alavache, was the suspect.
LCSO “I honestly, I was in shock. Because I can’t put the Sterling that we know, and that we love, and care about, even close to the person who did that,” said Laurence. “That’s not Sterling. That’s all I can think, that’s not who Sterling is…or was.”
Laurence first met Alavache in 2021, when he started volunteering at the Wintergarden Food Pantry in Port Charlotte.
Underneath his bright smiles, was the grip of addiction.
“What people are reading about what happened, that was his addiction,” Laurence said.
Lee County deputies release new video of the fatal bank robbery stand-off
Alavache’s struggles with addiction are well documented.