Nancy Kerrigan Ice Skated With Planned Parenthood Shooting Victim, Police Officer Garrett Swasey

Nancy Kerrigan says she was “devastated” when she learned that Garrett Swasey was one of the three victims killed during the Friday afternoon shooting at a Planned Parenthood event in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Swasey was one of the police officers who responded to the shooting. He was also a former ice skater who actually skated with Kerrigan when they were kids.

Garrett Swasey and Nancy Kerrigan were incredibly close they were younger, but they didn’t stay in touch as much when their lives took different paths. Swasey would move to Colorado Springs, where he would eventually find work as a police officer and pastor, and Kerrigan would go on to become a household name after winning medals in the 1992 and 1994 Olympics.

However, Nancy Kerrigan is probably best-known for the ugly attack that took place before the 1994 U.S. Figure Skating Championships. As the New York Post reports, an assailant used a black baton to whack Nancy Kerrigan in the knee when she was leaving skating practice one day. Cameras recorded a devastated Nancy’s tears, and the media had a field day once it was discovered that her rival, Tonya Harding, was connected to the assailant. Kerrigan’s injury wasn’t a career-ender, but it forced her to withdraw from the Championships. Tonya Harding took advantage of her absence and went on to win the competition.

Nancy Kerrigan may always be remembered for being the victim in one of the most bizarre stories in sports history, and her old friend may always be remembered for being a victim of yet another mass shooting in America. However, Nancy didn’t talk about the “whys” of her friend’s death during a recent interview with the Boston Herald — she didn’t mention gun control, mental health, or those infamous Planned Parenthood videos. Instead, the former Olympian chose to remember the good times she and Garrett Swasey shared growing up together in Stoneham, Massachusetts. According to Kerrigan, she and Swasey spent plenty of time skating together, but their friendship went beyond their shared passion for flying across the ice.

“We were together an awful lot as children. I would ride my bike to his house and we’d hang out at the pool,” Kerrigan said. “We were together all the time, whether were skating or not.”

Everything we know about the police officer killed in the Planned Parenthood shooting https://t.co/wRtwEtaMoN

— TIME.com (@TIME) November 28, 2015

Kerrigan revealed that she and Swasey had a brother-sister relationship, and they even had silly nicknames for each other that sound exactly like the type of teasing labels that siblings dream up: Garrett was “Ugh” and Nancy was “Yuck.” Nancy Kerrigan loved how Garrett Swasey was always trying to make her laugh, and he was a very positive person who always had a smile on his face. “I don’t ever remember him ever being in a bad mood,” Kerrigan said.

“He was always ready to listen, to be there, to help, to encourage somebody else. He was just a really good friend, very loyal and kind. He had a big, giant, smile all the time.”

Nancy Kerrigan ‘devastated’ by friend’s slaying https://t.co/KYV7kwVCNv pic.twitter.com/lxhxNGqmVb — Boston Herald (@bostonherald) November 29, 2015

According to the Denver Post, Garrett Swasey and his ice dancing partner, Christine Fowler, won the 1992 junior national ice dancing championship. Swasey and Fowler performed in ice dancing musicals in Maine after ending their competitive careers, and Swasey eventually ended up in Colorado Springs. He became a police officer at the University of Colorado campus in Colorado Springs six years ago, and Yahoo! News reports that the 44-year-old father of two also worked as a volunteer pastor at Colorado Springs’ Hope Chapel. He enjoyed playing the guitar, and he taught churchgoers how to play the instrument.

Nancy Kerrigan said that she and Garrett Swasey didn’t keep in touch as much after he moved to Colorado Springs, where the former ice dancer worked as a coach. According to the Washington Post, Garrett Swasey’s mother wanted him to keep on coaching and training, but he made the fateful decision to join the police force instead.

Before Swasey’s death, Kerrigan was seemingly unaware that her old pal had joined the police force in Colorado Springs, but she wasn’t surprised to learn that he decided to become a cop. According to Nancy, it makes “total sense” that her kind and caring friend decided to dedicate his life to helping others.

[Photo by Bryan Bedder/Getty Images for BNP Paribas]