AURORA - Moments before sunset Tuesday, machine company supervisor Gil Buckles and one of his top troubleshooters, Brian Gleason, were celebrating their company's success with a steak dinner at a local restaurant.

"My boss was out from California, so we were all celebrating the good first half of the year," Buckles said Friday. "We were discussing how to repeat the performance for the second half of the year."

Gleason was valuable at H.G. Makelim, where he had been a manager and service trainer since 2005, Buckles said.

"He was a great guy. He did anything anyone ever asked," Buckles said. "He stayed late, came in early. I mean, we're a small staff of four people and many times he was here with me until one in the morning."

Their happiness veered into tragedy moments after their dinner. As the 49-year-old Thornton man was heading home on Smith Road, police say, a 27- year-old felon sped through a red light at Chambers Road at 7:54 p.m.

Buckles, following close behind, saw a blur out of the corner of his eye and watched a silver car collide with Gleason's white van and clip a third car.

"I was shaking so bad I couldn't dial 911 and the police arrived within a minute," Buckles said. "They surrounded the guy's car that hit him and then I went over and I saw Brian, and I was pretty sure he was dead."

Buckles said he started yelling for someone to call an ambulance. "By that time, someone pulled me to get away, because there could be shooting.

Family friend Lisa Kowalik, of Thornton, spoke on behalf Gleason's wife, Susan, Friday afternoon. She thanked the public for its concern and said Gleason's employer has set up a memorial fund.

Employees, alone, have raised $1,000, a company official said.

Money is being raised to help Gleason's seventh-grade daughter, who has been traveling to New York for treatment of an undisclosed medical condition.

"Everybody is just stunned," Kowalik said.

"One day I was talking to him; the next day he isn't there."

Memorial fund

An Aurora company has set up a fund for Brian Gleason, the 49-year-old Thornton man who was killed by a fleeing motorist Tuesday evening, according to police.

Gleason spent 20 years in the pump and engine industry and joined H.G. Makelim Co. in 2005 as a technical troubleshooter.

The money will go to help Gleason's wife, Sue, and their two children.

To help, go to hgmakelim.com or send a check to H.G. Makelim Co., Gleason Family Fund, 219 Shaw Road, San Francisco, CA 94080.

lehndorffb@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-2792.