Ever the joker, 29-year-old Robert Zuchowski teased his mother for being short, liked popping out of unexpected places to startle her, played with foreign accents.

Yet he also was the man who couldn’t wait to marry his fiance, Casey Reichmand, the big brother who adored his younger siblings, the father who wept the first time he rocked his baby girl in his arms.

But Zuchowski’s life came to a violent, unexpected end April 8. Just after 11 a.m. he was in a car with his little brother, Ryan, 20, and his little brother’s girlfriend when he saw a stranger walking through his mother’s neighborhood. The man, whom he did not know, flashed some sort of gang sign. Robert jumped out and chased him.

The man pulled out a stolen pistol and fired from about 15 feet away, striking Robert once in the chest, killing him. He fired at Ryan, too, but missed.

Police recovered seven shell casings.

Robert’s mother, Suzanne Waltman, would not speculate about what happened, but said that the oldest of her five children was extremely protective of his family and especially her, and that might have pushed him from the car.

“What I do know is that this happened just one street over from here,” Waltman said, adding that Robert had dropped by to finish painting her house but had locked his keys inside and was returning from picking up a spare pair at his brother’s girlfriend’s house. “Robert wasn’t the type of kid that would just pull over and start a fight with someone. His brother said he was provoked, that the guy told him to get out of the car.”

The 19-year-old suspect, whom police identify as a known gang member, sits today in King County jail on $1 million bail for an unrelated crime. King County prosecutors are still mulling the case. He is expected to claim self-defense.

Zuchowski leaves behind his 2-year-old daughter, Hailie, his 9-year-old stepson, Hector, sisters, 23, 22 and 10, his 20-year-old brother, and a 24-year-old half-brother in Arizona.

Born in Phoenix, he moved to Washington with his family when he was 1½ years old. He attended junior high in California, then Auburn High School but dropped out in his senior year. He earned his GED later. Recently he was laid off from his job with the Shipwrights Union.

Looking over photographs, Waltman and Reichmand talked about what they have lost.

“Robert was the kind of guy who would go out of his way to help just about anybody, even if he didn’t know them,” Waltman said. “And he was always over here helping me with cleaning off my roof or painting or whatever I needed help with. I am going to miss his big heart, and how he loved his family and how proud he was to be a dad and him coming by all time to give me hugs and tell me he loved me. I will miss not being able to watch him raise his daughter.”

Waltman said Robert was a devoted Christian who shared his Lord with everybody.

He also was passionate about weightlifting, snowboarding and his pitbull, Brutus.

But in the end, family was what really mattered.

“He was affectionate to everybody, but he definitely loved his brothers and sisters,” Waltman said, “When they were born, he would help me change their diapers, play with them, entertain them, just be silly with them.”

“He was a very, very good father,” Reichmand said. “He just cried the first time he held Hailie, he was so happy. When she cried in the middle of the night, he did all the waking up and taking care of her. He liked to wrestle with my son. His dream was to own a house for his family.”

Casey said Robert had his bashful side. Their first three dates, she said, passed in silence, both being too shy to say a word.

“He had his silly side. He used a lot of different voices, every accent you could think of,” Reichmand added. “Sometimes when he’d get stuck on an accent, he’d be like that for a couple days. Any movie he ever watched, he’d be talking like that for the next week or two. He did Borat all the time and had everybody at work talking like that too.”

“I’d say he was a mama’s boy because he stopped by just about every night to give me a hug before he went home. I’m going to miss that,” Waltman said softly. “He was a good guy.”