We routinely cover vigils, which are usually held to memorialize someone taken from us all too soon.

Just this past Sunday night we joined those outside the Pham home in Upper Darby as they huddled in the dark and cold to remember the victim of the horrific home invasion, torture and killing of Hoa Pham.

There is another type of vigil being held this week in a courtroom in Media. It is no less sad.

The family and friends of Jason Shephard have traveled from South Dakota here to Delaware County to pay tribute to the young intern who was murdered here more than two years ago.

They must sit every day in a courtroom and hear the brutal details of the last moments of their loved one’s life.

Shephard was a college student and intern who was here on business for an electronic sign company. Authorities believe he was drugged and killed inside the home of a Thornbury man. As the trial opened this week, the district attorney’s office spelled out the grim outline of what they think happened. They allege that Bill Smithson slipped Shephard the date-rape drug GHB in a plot to have sex with him. When the young intern awoke during the attack and tried to fend Smithson off, he was strangled.

It is a lurid case, one that no doubt is likely to get more lurid in the days ahead. Bill Smithson is on trial for his life. Jason Shephard has already lost his.

And those who remain, who knew him and loved him best, now sit and hold an honorable vigil as they hear the gruesome details of the last few hours of Jason’s life.

It is something you wouldn’t wish on anyone. But it also reminds us of the basic dignity and honor of people who traveled across the country here to Delaware County to make sure we all do not lose sight of what was lost inside that Thornbury home.