Friends and family of a victim killed in San Diego's Gaslamp Quarter gathered in El Cajon Saturday night to remember their son and friend.
21-year-old Conner Kepple, who died Thursday on his 21st birthday, was a former Granite Hills High School student. That’s where dozens of his friends, co-workers and family members lit candles, prayed and remembered the good times from Kepple’s life.
“I may be smiling, guys, but this is one of the hardest things I've had to do,” Kepple’s mother, Annie Stuard, said. She stood in the bed of a pick-up truck in the parking lot of the high school addressing Kepple’s friends.
“Stop the partying, the drugs, the alcohol and really live life like Conner!” Stuard said.
The chanting and cheering from the crowd of loved ones made it seem unlike an ordinary candle light vigil. Then again, for the people in attendance, Kepple was not an ordinary guy.
“Most remarkable young guy you'd ever meet. So determined and ambitious and happy and courageous and full of life," Matt Carter said. Carter is engaged to Kepple’s mother, Stuard. He was looking forward to being Kepple’s step-dad.
“He was just an incredible man,” he said.
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Kepple was one of three children, an uncle a friend and an EMT. Friends say he liked to have fun and are heartbroken over his loss.
“I have no words for this tragedy that took place last Friday night,” Stuard said.
Kepple died on Thursday, his 21st birthday, five days after loved ones say he fell victim to violence in the Gaslamp District.
San Diego police are investigating it as a suspicious death and believe he was involved in a violent confrontation in downtown's Gaslamp District. They believe the altercation happened in the early morning hours of March 5 at a business on 400 E Street. On March 9, police received a call from a local hospital reporting a patient who had suffered from possible blunt force trauma and was in serious condition.
Police are now creating a timeline to figure out how the young man died, and if anyone had a hand in it. Investigators say he visited several businesses in downtown San Diego on March 5, and they’re questioning multiple employees across those establishments, but say it's too early in the investigation to release the names of those businesses.
The day before Kepple died, hospital staff told police a patient with blunt force trauma was in serious condition. Kepple later passed away at Sharp Memorial Hospital.
“What happened to my son, our brother, our uncle our friend is a tragedy,” Stuard said. A tragedy for so many who loved Kepple and now who look to him as an example of how to live.
“If we can take anything from this, it is to live life like Conner would have,” Stuard told Kepple’s friends.
