Jeffrey Martin had legalese flowing in his veins.

Martin, 33, had decided when he was young he wanted to be a lawyer. He paid his way through law school at Case Western Reserve University in Ohio.

The Melrose, Mass., resident spent his summers during college working at the Boston law office of his older cousin, Robert Martin.

"He was really inquisitive about life," Robert Martin told The Providence Journal. "He was really getting started." Martin impressed colleagues at John Hancock Insurance Co. in Boston, providing legal counsel for the firm's trading and brokerage subsidiaries. But Martin's seriousness at work melted when it came to the 1980s band Great White. He attended many of the band's concerts, and had photographs of himself with guitarist, Ty Longley. "He had personal notes from the band," said David Bloom, husband of Martin's stepmother. "He just loved that music." Martin went with a friend to the Great White show at The Station. The friend escaped the fire. Martin was born in Boston, and spent his teenage years in southern California. He graduated with a degree in political science from the University of California at Santa Cruz. "He was reaching a point in his life where he was really happy, and that was a good thing," said Bloom. "He was a kid on his way up."