Mueller Company shooting victim leaves behind two-year-old daughter, wife

BOAZ, Ala. (WAFF) -Two men are dead after an early Tuesday morning shooting in Albertville.

WAFF 48 talked with loved ones of one of those victims, Michael Lee Dobbins to find out how he is being remembered.

”He left a two-year-daughter who will probably never remember her dad. Left a wife, they were just getting their lives established, just getting started. Left a father and a mother who shouldn’t have to bury a son before themselves,” Zachary Paton Jones, lifelong friend of Michael Lee Dobbins said.

Paton Jones and Michael Lee Dobbins, who was known as Lee, were inseparable since the fifth grade.

Jones tells me it’s like losing a brother.

“Words can’t even do it justice. I mean he wasn’t a good man, he was a great man,” he explained.

Dobbins’ father, who also works at Mueller, helped Lee get a job there. Lee’s father was not working when the shooting happened.

Dobbins’ family says they had to wait five hours before they found out their loved one was a victim.

“The first thing she said, ‘He’s gone.’ Like I said, she knew what I was calling about,’ Jones said.

“It’s not like he killed just one person and it’s done or two people and it’s done. It’s the whole family now that suffers. And what impact does that have on their mental health,” Jones said.

Jones says Dobbins was kind, responsible and worked hard to provide for his family.

“If you wanted to see how a man should be raised and how a man should act, it was Lee. When he was getting off work, Daisy was waking up and he would take care of her. I don’t even know when the guy slept,” he said.

Jones tells us there’s no way for them to get closure, but he hopes the world can become a more caring place.

“We’re all in this together. We all live in this same world together and we got to take care of each other,” Jones said.

The Dobbins family is now busy making funeral arrangements. You can support the family through this GoFundMe.

His wife says the alleged shooter should never have made it in with a gun.

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