This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2017, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
Seven years ago, Barry Michael Zumwalt's bouts with mental illness ended his marriage to Eliza Spears. But even though their union ended, their love endured.
"He was one of my best friends, a wonderful, very loving, very kind person," Spears said Wednesday, adding that even when she remarried, he accepted — and became a part of — her new family.
"He was so amazing. He embraced my life," the mother of five said, adding that Zumwalt not only cared for his 7-year-old son, Joel, but also "loved all my children. The other kids called him 'Uncle Barry.' He was part of our family."
Memories reduced Spears to tears more than once as she recounted Zumwalt's rapid mental disintegration in the days leading up to his fatal shooting during a confrontation with law officers at a Tooele County incinerator plant last Sunday.
Zumwalt — honorably discharged from the U.S. Navy in 2005 after a manic episode and subsequent diagnosis of "type II bipolar disorder with psychotic tendencies" — began to slip into depression several weeks ago.
Frightened by changes in his behavior — his lack of sleep, skipped meals and mood swings from the dark to euphoric — Spears and others begged him to check into the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Salt Lake City.
"He [had become] very irregular with his meds," Spears said. "He didn't like the way they made him feel; he wanted to feel his emotions, even though without his meds they weren't controllable."
Before his death, the last manic break suffered by Zumwalt, at least that Spears knew of, was in August 2009. That lasted nearly a month before he was hospitalized.
Then, in early February, he visited Spears, and she told him she feared he was losing touch with reality once more.
"I know," he told her. "I can feel it coming."
Spears urged him to see his VA psychiatrist, and he agreed. Despite new prescriptions to counter depression, anxiety and psychosis, he was riding an emotional roller coaster.
Spears said he checked into the hospital Feb. 22, but was released the next day after assuring doctors that he was not suicidal or a danger to others.
Jill Atwood, spokeswoman for Salt Lake City's veterans hospital, said she could not discuss any patient's specific case, but noted that the center's doors are "always open to vets," including access to an emergency room crisis team, post-traumatic stress disorder clinics and a suicide-prevention team.
Despite his visit to the hospital, Zumwalt continued to sink into delusion and manic behavior, Spears said. During the next several days, Spears, along with Zumwalt's parents from Elko, Nev., repeatedly tried to intervene.
At one point, Zumwalt, apparently intent on returning to his Elko childhood home, drove his pickup truck as far as Wells, Nev., before running out of gas. Confused about how he had gotten there, he called his father, Don Zumwalt, to pick him up.
Spears said the elder Zumwalt — who could not be reached for comment Wednesday — drove his son back to Salt Lake City late on the night of Feb. 25. The father made sure he had groceries and a meal, and accompanied his son into his apartment's bathroom to see that he took his medications.
Plans were made to see Zumwalt again Sunday, preparing him for a return to the hospital Monday to be admitted for further psychiatric care.
But time ran out about 6:30 a.m. Sunday morning, shortly after Zumwalt, appearing to be armed, showed up outside the fence of the Clean Harbors incinerator site in remote Tooele County.
Later that morning, police officers showed up at Spears home, initially saying they wanted to ensure she was safe but not revealing Zumwalt was dead.
It was noon, Spears said, when detectives arrived to tell her that Zumwalt had been shot in a confrontation with a Tooele County sheriff's deputy and Utah Highway Patrol trooper.
"They told me that Barry was screaming that his wife and child were in danger, inside the building, and that he needed to get them out," Spears said. "He was just trying to get to us, trying to get into the building where he thought we were."
Utah County sheriff's Sgt. Spencer Cannon, noting the ongoing nature of the investigation, said he was unable to discuss specifics of the case.
He could say only that the 36-year-old West Valley City man had followed employees into the fenced site and made threats to blow up propane tanks. Employees called 911, and the two law officers arrived armed with rifles. When Zumwalt pointed what appeared to be a handgun at them, they fired.
Zumwalt, wounded, crawled under a nearby truck, where he died.
Investigators have been tight-lipped about how Zumwalt was armed, though an initial report that he had a both a rifle and a pistol has since been discounted.
Spears said she knew of no firearms in Zumwalt's possession, but added that he did have a replica airsoft pistol that he was known to carry in a holster.
"I don't blame the officers. It looked like a real gun," Spears said. "And he definitely would have been agitated and aggressive when he got there."
Cannon, asked about the airsoft pistol, said he could not comment on the weapon found with Zumwalt's body. He said more information may be released later this week, once autopsy results and interviews with the officers involved are completed.
Investigators have been perplexed as to how Zumwalt chose the incinerator site, literally at the end of a desert road, for what apparently devolved into his final manic act.
But Spears believes she knows why.
"There was something about the Nevada desert and Elko that was always comforting to him," she said. "I think he was on the way home, saw this [incinerator] building and his mind told him we were in danger."
Spears is comforted that no one else was hurt, and holds no ill will toward either of the officers, who remained on administrative leave pending review of the shooting.
Still, she was struggling Wednesday, four days after the event, with how to tell her young son that his father was dead. Somehow, Spears said, she will stress his love and the happy memories as a hedge against the sad, violent reality of Zumwalt's death.
"I want the public to know he was not a terrorist, that this was not premeditated," Spears stressed.
As for herself, she remembers — now with haunting poignancy — the last conversation she had with her best friend, just days before his death.
"He was very excited, very 'up,' and I was a little scared. I just listened to him [as he] told me how much he cared for me, that he could never repay me for the gift of our son," Spears recalled.
"This disease tortured him for most of his life. He wanted so much to just be normal."
A memorial fund (https://www.youcaring.com/barryzumwalt-767297) has been established to help Zumwalt's family with funeral expenses.
Twitter: @remims