Man shot in Lake Havasu
Stacy Hakes survived addiction, prison and COVID-19. Once clean and free, he was fatally shot visiting family in Lake Havasu City on Easter.
Family and friends say the life of a man who impacted many was taken too soon after he was fatally shot in Lake Havasu City on Easter Sunday.
Stacy Hakes was visiting for the weekend from Phoenix and spent several hours decorating eggs with his daughter before he went out for the night, said his mother, Debra Hunsaker.
“He just wanted to kind of, I guess, go have a drink and be with some old friends,” she told The Arizona Republic.
But in the early morning hours on April 4, police responded to a report of a person shot and found Hakes, 37, with a gunshot wound in a parked vehicle near Sunfield Drive and Palo Verde Boulevard.
At about 3 a.m., police said Hakes succumbed to his injuries at the scene after officers tried to save him.
Police said the investigation was ongoing and that the shooting was not a random act. On Monday, police arrested Adeline Rea, 31, and Ramon Ca
nas, 44, on suspicion of being accessories to the fatal shooting. Both are facing charges of first-degree murder.
Lake Havasu City police have an arrest warrant out for and asked for the public’s help on Tuesday to locate Lake Havasu City resident Brian William Robinson, 36, who police said fatally shot Hakes and is believed to be in the Tucson area. Police had not released any details about what led to the shooting or arrests as of Tuesday.
Family says Hakes turned his life around after serving time in prison
After news of his death, dozens of friends and family took to social media to honor and remember Hakes. His family said he grew up in Lake Havasu City and was well known as a former MMA fighter called “Hammer,” a high school varsity football player and BMX champion in his hometown.
He was “loved by so many people,” said Hunsaker, and worked hard to turn his life around after struggling with drug abuse and his health condition, pulmonary hypertension, while serving more than six years in Arizona prisons.
Hakes was killed seven months after his release from the Arizona State Prison Complex Whetstone unit in Tucson, where he served time for drug violations,
according to the Arizona Department of Corrections, Rehabilitation and Reentry inmate data.
Hunsaker said her son, who spoke to The Republic about the conditions of the Whetstone prison in Tucson during the COVID-19 pandemic last year, had been sober for more than eight years and was a “stand-up” person at the prison.
Prison records show he was never disciplined for violence or considered a high risk.
“He would tell me, ‘Mom, if I wouldn’t have gotten such a long sentence,’ like he did, that he probably would not have changed his ways,” Hunsaker said. “But all that time, he wasn’t angry about it, he was like, ‘It made me really realize everything that’s important to me’ and he changed his life.”
Hunsaker said she was worried Hakes wouldn’t survive the pandemic while in prison due to his medical condition and the quality of health care at the prison. While at Whetstone, which had the largest outbreak of COVID-19 at the time, Hakes got sick with the novel coronavirus, he told The Republic last year.
But Hakes survived and was released in September. Hunsaker said he then moved to Phoenix, started new medication and continued working at the Hometown Hero Project, an Arizona organization that connects active and retired military, first responders and teachers with other organizations and businesses.
“He was starting to feel better, he was going to the gym, doing the things that he loved again,” Hunsaker said.
Although Hakes struggled in his own life, his aunt, Patricia Rose, said it’s “always been really clear to me that he always had a heart to help other people.” She also said Hakes “adored” his teenage daughter, who he consistently visited on the weekends in Lake Havasu City.
‘Heart of gold’: Friends, co-workers say Hakes was like family to them
Clay Stevens is the Scottsdale location manager for Hometown Hero Project and supervised Hakes, whom he considered a best friend.
“He was like family to me,” Stevens said. “He was a really good guy.”
Hakes started working for the organization about five years ago while he was in prison. He worked as a club organizer, which manages the digital programs at VFW and American Legion posts for veterans nationwide, his co-workers said.
He was always the first one to work and the last one to leave and never missed a day of work, said Stevens and Hunsaker. “Anything that needed to be done, he was the first one to step up,” Stevens said.
Since Hakes started working in the rehabilitation job in prison, Stevens said he watched Hakes “grow into a man that his daughter could be proud to call father, his mother could be proud to call son.”
“Coming from Stacy’s background, the turnaround is not easy,” Stevens said.
Learning how not to react to situations and putting pride aside is a “very difficult task, but he worked really hard on those things and I’m definitely proud to call him a brother,” Stevens said.
Hakes was also remembered by his co-workers as a person who lit up a room, was goofy, liked to tell jokes, dance and do handstands.
Helping other men turn their life around through his work was also “really, really” important to Hakes, his co-workers said.
“He’s got a heart of gold, a smile that will be missed forever,” said Phillip Bryan, finance director for the organization. “Great work ethic, very respectful, very personable. I don’t think I’ve ever met a person that did not like Stacy.”
Doug Hunter said he knew Hakes for about 25 years and did MMA with him. Hunter said Hakes was “all smiles all the time, was fearless, was just a positive person all the time.”
He said Hakes never lied, was sincere, caring and helped him turn his own life around.
“He was just a very carefree happy guy and he really was a great dad,” Hunter said. “Didn’t have a shady bone in his body ... he was just real. Everybody that knows him would agree with that.”
A GoFundMe account for Hakes’ family has raised more than $10,500 from friends and family as of Tuesday afternoon.
Anyone with information about the shooting can contact Lake Havasu City police at 928-855-1171 or Silent Witness at 928-854-8477 to remain anonymous. Tips can also be submitted anonymously at www.tipsoft.com or a TipSubmit phone application.
Robinson, who police said is suspected of the shooting, is 6 feet 4 inches, has brown hair and green eyes and goes by “Tree.” Police said Robinson has an amputated right arm, multiple tattoos on his upper body and the letters “BERDOO” tattooed on his stomach.
A spokesperson for Lake Havasu City said the investigation was still ongoing as of Tuesday and that the primary suspect in this case had not been arrested or interviewed.
“Due to this still being a very fluid and quickly evolving situation, no further details are available for release at the moment,” the spokesperson said.