WESTFIELD – The city has one fewer homeless person – but that’s not a good thing.
Warren E. Shepard, 51, was found bloody and unconscious early Wednesday morning on the ground near Bartlett Street. At Baystate Noble Hospital, he was found to have expired.
The police were alerted at 3:19 a.m. by Angel D. “Loco” Hernandez who said “I saw something funny” on the ground behind the Elm Street barber shop where he works and realized it was a man with blood on his head.
Hernandez said “I thought he was drunk” but went on to say that he changed his mind when he was unable to awaken the man.
He ran to a nearby 24-hour gas staton to call police before returning to Bartlett Street.
Hernandez said that the responding police unsuccessfully attempted to revive Shepard with CPR and when the Fire Department paramedics arrived they found a sign of life. Shepard was transported to the hospital where he was found to be deceased.
Police had encountered Shepard earlier in the evening when they responded to a 10:50 p.m call Tuesday for a suspicious person at a Court Street apartment building. There, the officers found Shepard trying to sleep in the vestibule.
They report Shepard left that building without incident.
The Hampden County Medical Examiner claimed jurisdiction of the case but no autopsy results can be expected yet.
According to a schoolmate of Shepard, he is a descendant of General William Shepard, a “favorite son” of Westfield and a Revolutionary War military officer. The man also said that Shepard had struggled with alcohol since he was in high school.
