On the morning of September 11, 2024, two life-altering events were unfolding for one Filipino family in Chicago. In a hospital room, Roan Masangkay was in labor, preparing to welcome her second child into the world. Miles away, her 40-year-old fiancé, Mark Carlo “Kaloy” Arceta, was driving to his last shift as a research supervisor before starting a joyful paternity leave. His mind was surely on the new life he was about to meet. But in a brutal twist of fate, their paths would never cross again. The day Kaloy became a father for the second time was also the day his life was tragically stolen.

Kaloy Arceta was the embodiment of the immigrant dream. Hailing from Majayjay, Laguna, he moved to the United States and built a life through hard work and a kind, humble spirit. He was a beloved supervisor at Northwestern University and a friend to everyone, earning the nickname “Air-oy” for his admiration of Michael Jordan. He found love with Roan, a massage therapist, and lovingly raised her daughter from a previous relationship as his own. With a wedding planned for the next year and a new baby on the way, their future seemed bright and full of promise.

That future was obliterated by the desperate, violent actions of others. In the pre-dawn hours of September 11, a large “smash-and-grab” ring targeted a high-end Louis Vuitton store on Chicago’s Magnificent Mile. After ramming a truck through the front window, a group of men ransacked the store and fled in two getaway vehicles, leading police on a high-speed chase through the city.

Kaloy Arceta was simply on his way to work. As he drove his Honda CRV through an intersection, one of the getaway cars, a Kia fleeing at an estimated 100 miles per hour, ran a red light and slammed directly into his driver’s side door. The impact was catastrophic. Kaloy was rushed to the hospital but was pronounced dead. According to the medical examiner, his death was instant. He was simply in the wrong place at the very worst time.

The most heartbreaking part of the tragedy unfolded in the hospital. Just hours after giving birth to their healthy baby boy, Mark Dylan, Roan received the phone call that shattered her world. The moment of her greatest joy was irrevocably fused with the moment of her deepest sorrow.

The senselessness of the crime sparked an outpouring of grief and support. Colleagues and relatives held a vigil at the crash site, leaving flowers, messages, and a basketball in memory of the die-hard Michael Jordan fan. A GoFundMe page organized for Roan and her two children quickly raised over $70,000 to help the family navigate their uncertain future.

His mother, Alejandra, remembered her son as a healthy, hardworking man who was just beginning to enjoy the family he had always wanted. “Maybe he is a sacrificial lamb,” she said through her tears, finding a sliver of meaning in the fact that his death led to the immediate capture of seven members of the dangerous criminal gang. The suspects, all of whom have extensive criminal records, were denied bail and face a litany of felony charges.

In the most poignant and tragic scene of all, newborn Mark Dylan “met” his father for the first time at his funeral, a tiny infant in a room filled with grief for the man he would only ever know through stories and photographs. Kaloy Arceta’s story is a profound tragedy of a good man’s life, stolen not by failure or fault, but by a random, violent collision with a world of crime that he had no part in.