Friday, July 29, 2005

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Terror victim has local connection

Mom speaks about daughter killed in Egypt bombing

By LEE WILLIAMS
lwilliams@TheCitizenNews.com

Kristina Miller was a free-spirit who loved to just pack up and go see the world.

England. Amsterdam. By the ripe old age of 26, Miller had been there. Done that.

So when the Las Vegas native told her mother, Susan McNeely of Peachtree City, that she was going to spend her 27th birthday touring Egypt, a volatile region, with her new Briton beau Keri Davies, McNeely didn’t think twice.

But as fate would have it, this trip would be unlike any other.

At about 1:15 a.m. Saturday, three bombs ripped through portions of Egypt, killing 88 people and wounding 200 others. Miller and Davies were among those killed by explosives set off by terrorists at the Red Sea resort in Sharm El-Sheikh, a popular tourist attraction for Britons.

A reported 9,000 Britons were visiting the resort at the time of the bombings.

McNeely and her family were traumatized by the news.

“We were just devastated,” said McNeely, 46, seated in the living room across from her husband, Robert, 41. “We were just in shock. We’ve worn ourselves out crying.”

McNeely said they are going through a range of emotions. One minute, they are angry and sad, and the next they are numb.

Miller died just hours afters celebrating her 27th birthday. But Miller’s last hours were happy ones.

“On her birthday, they went parasailing and horseback riding,” McNeely said.

McNeely said her daughter was living in England. She had followed her father, Anthony Miller, who had gone to England to set up a sports betting business. England is where she met her new boyfriend, Keri. The two had been dating for 3 1/2 months.

Miller had a college degree and had the world at her feet. In two weeks after her trip to Egypt, Miller and Davies were going to work at a company in Melbourne, Australia, her mother said.

But her rosy future was cut short by the terrorists’ actions.

Accompanied by his wife, Laura, President George Bush denounced the bombings during a visit to the Egyptian Embassy Monday. Bush visited the embassy to sign a condolence book.

"Laura and I have come to your embassy to express our heart-felt sympathies for those who have lost their lives, and our strong determination to stand with the government of Egypt and the people of Egypt in rejecting this kind of violence and terror,” Bush told Egyptian Ambassador Nabil Fahmy. “The people who struck in Sharm el-Sheikh killed Muslims, innocent mothers and dads, people who were trying to make a living. They have no heart, they have no conscience, and they have no ideology that is hopeful. And they have an ideology of hate.”

McNeely said her daughter was very much pro-Bush and supported the war on terror. So did McNeely.

Support for the war on terror is wavering, but McNeely said now is not the time to give up. McNeely wants to tell the world terrorism is a cancer on the planet that cannot be ignored. Her husband agreed.

She said the terrorists who did this to her daughter are murderers.

“We want to get her name out there and get the word out there to the American people that we feel that President Bush is trying to do everything he can to protect us and make this a safer country, and that’s how Kristi felt,” McNeely said.

McNeely said her family is not going to let Kristi die in vain because what happened to Kristi could happen to others.

On Wednesday, Miller is expected to be laid to rest in her hometown. Hundreds, if not thousands, are expected to attend the event that has brought terrorism home to Peachtree City and the world.