In Memory of Megan Boken: One Year Later

One year after 23-year-old Wheaton resident and St. Louis University volleyball star Megan Boken was robbed and murdered in St. Louis, the school’s volleyball team held its first Megan Boken Alumni Game Saturday to raise money for the Megan Boken Fund, Fox2 St. Louis reports. (See above video.)

The fund currently supports the Megan E. Boken Memorial Scholarship at St. Francis High School in Wheaton, Boken’s alma mater. SLU has also established the Megan Boken award ("to the team member who best represents the SLU volleyball program") and the Boken award ("to the student who is the ultimate teammate and member of the athletics community.") 

Presenting the latter award earlier in 2013, Boken’s former teammate Grace Bonoma remembered her as someone who "was able to make a lasting impression on everyone she met, no matter how long or how short the interaction.

"She was the girl on campus who was friends with everyone and who never had anything bad to say," Bonoma said in her presenting speech. "She was the person who fed pizza to strangers on the Lacleades dance floor and the girl who danced to the Baywatch theme song in our locker room before matches.” 

Boken, a 2011 graduate of SLU’s John Cook School of Business, was shot and killed in the early morning of Aug. 18, 2012, outside a St. Louis apartment.

According to police, a man later identified as 18-year-old Keith Esters confessed to having targeted Megan after seeing her talking on her iPhone, for which she had replaced her Blackberry just a month earlier. In the process of the robbery, Esters shot her twice and killed her, police said.

Esters, 18, of Bel Ridge, Mo., has been charged with a Class A felony of first-degree murder, two counts of armed criminal action and attempted robbery. His cousin Johnathan Perkins is charged with the Class A felony of second-degree murder, two counts of armed criminal action and attempted robbery.

Boken's murder continues to be mentioned in a national debate over the high rate of crimes committed for valuable cell phones.

More on Boken's memory can be found at her fund website. 

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