It has been less than two weeks since Elliot Rodger took the lives of seven people near the University of California, Santa Barbara. The father of one of the victims joined HuffPost Live on June 2 to reflect on his son's life, remembering him as gentle and kind, and to talk about why he has been so outspoken in the media since the tragedy.
The day after the killing spree, Richard Martinez held a press conference in honor of his son, 20-year-old Christopher Michaels-Martinez. The father's message was simple: "When will this insanity stop?"
When Martinez spoke with HuffPost Live's Marc Lamont Hill on Monday, he reflected on his painful new reality and shared stories about his son's life. Just before Christopher's death, he said, the father-son pair were in the middle of a competition.
"I had recently just started working out and was losing some weight and lifting weights and so forth, and he challenged me to an arm wrestle," Martinez said. "But I told him he had to give me a couple of months because I wasn’t ready, and I kept putting it off because I knew he was going to kick my ass."
That's just one of the things Martinez will never be able to experience with his son.
"My son is gone. That’s a hole in my life that I can never fill," he said.
Watch the full interview with UCSB victim's father Richard Martinez below: