Friends remember homeless man killed near downtown Las Vegas

At a modest memorial service in a central valley church Friday afternoon, friends and strangers of a homeless man killed Feb. 3 near downtown Las Vegas struggled to understand “why.”

David Dunn, 60, was bludgeoned to death while sleeping in the area of City and Grand Central parkways. Police said it happened sometime after 1 a.m., when he was last seen, and sometime before 9 a.m., when his body was found still wrapped in blankets.

“I mean, we all have to die,” said Kit Mazurek, Dunn’s friend of 15 years, on Friday. “But the brutality of it — that’s what’s hard to accept.”

Mazurek, 60, said he first met Dunn while waiting in line at a nearby McDonald’s.

“Dave, with those crazy thick glasses, came up to me and said, ‘Do you want something?’” Mazurek told a small crowd in the Reformation Lutheran Church’s lunchroom. “He bought me a soda. I said, ‘Aren’t you gonna get something, too?’ He said, ‘I don’t have any money.’

“That was Dave. He would give his last penny to anyone,” he said.

Police don’t have any leads, but detectives believe Dunn’s death is related to another slaying of a homeless man, Daniel Aldape, 46, who was killed near the same intersection Jan. 4. Aldape also was bludgeoned to death while sleeping.

“You got such polar opposites here — Dave, who didn’t have anything, except joy and giving. And you got the guy who did this,” Mazurek said. “Total opposites.”

During the service, many made fun of the only photo they had of Dunn — a serious-faced portrait of him without a hat.

“I hate this picture because he didn’t look like that to me,” Pastor Jason Adams said. “He was always smiling, and he always had a hat on. We’re gonna paint a hat on that picture.”

Everyone laughed, then they shared more Dunn stories.

“A lot of people are depressed on the streets,” said Jimmy Laird II, 60, during the service. “Dave was always there to make people feel better. He was my best friend out here.”

“I’m still trying to figure it out,” Laird said. “Usually when you have enemies, you know who they are … Dave would never hurt nobody.”

After the service and during 2:30 p.m. mealtime, which Dunn attended regularly, the lunchroom was full. But the chair where Dunn usually sat was empty.

Instead, it was marked by a bouquet of flowers and a single candle and surrounded by his many sad, quiet friends.

Anyone with information about Aldape and Dunn’s deaths may contact Metro’s homicide section at 702-828-3521 or Crime Stoppers at 702-385-5555.

Contact Rachel Crosby at rcrosby@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-5290. Follow @rachelacrosby on Twitter.