A young man's "California Adventure" ended in violence after he was fatally injured on a Pacific Beach sidewalk early Mother’s Day.
Steven Kyle Wood was remembered Monday as “Mr. Personality.” He was the life of the party according to his mother, Tammi Holsomback. He was also her only son.
“He was my life. Really the only person I had to count on,” Holsomback told NBC 7 Monday. “I just want someone to realize what they’ve done."
The 26-year-old man had moved to San Diego to surf and work. Then, on May 11, his life took a dramatic turn.
Wood and his roommate were walking home from "Tavern at the Beach" around 2 a.m. when someone snuck up behind Wood and hit him in the back of the head, police said.
When Wood retaliated, a crowd gathered around.
San Diego police say Wood was later found unconscious in the street.
Paramedics took him to a nearby hospital to be treated for head injuries.
Wood never regained consciousness. He spent the next two weeks, that included his 27th birthday, in a medically-induced coma because of severe bleeding of the brain and other complications.
Then the final blow came - a stroke.
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His mother says when doctors were unable to help her son anymore, she curled up next to him Friday, praying for the strength to take him off life support.
"I prayed to Him all day long for Him to give me some kind of peace so I could tell him to go because, before that, I couldn’t," she said.
Now pictures and memories are all Wood's mother has left of her son who moved to San Diego a year and a half ago to surf and work.
A California adventure that ended in a nightmare for Wood and his family.
"I don’t want to put another person’s family through the sheer hell like we're going through. I don’t want all that, but I do want someone to accept responsibility," she said.
Homicide detectives determined the injuries from the fight caused his death, so they are now investigating the incident as a murder.
The SDPD says there are a few leads in the case, but detectives could use additional information from witnesses.
If you know anything about the fight on May 11, call the Homicide Unit at (619) 531-2293 or Crime Stoppers at (888) 580-8477.
One of the few things bringer Holsomback solace, the fact that she donated her son’s liver and kidneys, she said. That act will help save the lives of three other people.
Funeral arrangements have not yet been scheduled.
