Dobbeck, 36, was found shot to death Oct. 13 inside the 76 gas station market at Denny Way and Broad Street, near Seattle’s Space Needle. His family says the killing has been especially difficult to understand because investigators have not identified a motive.

U.S. marshals arrested Michael Oneal Fleming, 33, in Chicago on Oct. 20. Fleming, a former co-worker, is accused of shooting Dobbeck several times at close range inside the store. He was charged in absentia with first-degree murder with a firearm in King County Superior Court, and prosecutors requested $5 million bail. His arraignment was scheduled for Nov. 2 in Seattle. As of Monday, he was not in custody at King County Jail.

Court filings say security footage captured Fleming entering the store shortly after 5 a.m., taking a drink from a cooler and bringing it to the counter. Dobbeck can be heard greeting him before, according to the filings, Fleming walked toward the clerk’s area and fired at least four times from about two feet away. He then left the store.

Fleming had worked at Seattle gas stations for four years and left his job at the 76 earlier in October, according to the filings. The station’s owner told investigators there had been no apparent problem between Fleming and Dobbeck. Investigators have not established a motive. Fleming’s brother told investigators that the suspect’s recent texts were erratic and delusional and that he appeared to be experiencing a mental health crisis, according to a probable-cause affidavit.

Fleming is also a person of interest in the Oct. 19 shooting deaths of his mother, Rena Oneal, 59, and stepfather, Rodney Brushwood, 57, in their Kenosha, Wisconsin, home. The affidavit says the couple may have been dead for days before police found them during a welfare check.

Dobbeck’s mother, Linda LeClair, said he loved climbing trees, fantasy and science fiction, video games, animals, computers and playing trumpet in his high school orchestra. He was bullied growing up in Carlton, Oregon, and left high school before earning a GED, his family said. LeClair said the experience did not make him bitter.

“Sometimes that can have the opposite effect,” she said. “It can make a person bitter and hard, and it didn’t make (Graeme) that way.”

Dobbeck’s older sister, Holly Giesbrecht, said he was reserved around people he did not yet trust, but became talkative and eager to share his latest interests with those close to him. She described him as thoughtful and attentive to the people in his life.

At the gas station, where he had worked for about two years, Dobbeck treated the store as his own and made his employees’ well-being a priority, Giesbrecht said. He took difficult shifts, covered for co-workers who needed time off and brought lunch each Saturday to the employee working the day’s shift.

Giesbrecht said learning that a suspect had been arrested brought some relief, but she did not expect a particular legal outcome to heal the loss. What mattered, she said, was knowing he could not hurt anyone else or devastate another family.

“He should have had more time,” she said.