TAMPA, Fla. — At West Dog Park in Tampa's Leto community, the people are as much of a pack as the dogs.
"We would talk or text every day, 'Like, hey, will I see you today?' 'Oh yeah, I'll see you at this time.' And [he] would just bring a smile to my face," said Kim Wolsby, one of the frequenters at the park.
For those regulars, this particular Saturday morning was anything but a walk in the park.
Standing hand in hand, they all joined in mourning one of their own, John Walter Lay.
"A friend of mine said, 'Why would someone bring a gun to a dog park at 8:30 in the morning?' No one understands why," said Tommy, Lay's best friend of 33 years.
Lay was shot and killed in the dog park on Feb. 2.
The evening before his death, Lay sent a foreboding video to another friend about an incident that occurred that morning with George Declan Radford.
His friends say the suspected shooter, who also frequented the dog park, was known to throw homophobic slurs Lay's way.
The Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office never arrested the shooter. The department said Radford claimed self-defense. There were no witnesses to confirm or deny.
"Walter didn't deserve to go the way he did at all. No one deserves something like that to happen. For him to be... Just the brutality of it, and just it's unfathomable," said Tommy.
The case has even garnered attention from Equality Florida. Ant Avila, the Tampa Bay community organizer for Equality Florida, came out to the vigil.
"It's a continual, persistent plea for a fair justice process and that an investigation is taking place. So I think in terms of what it looks like, it's persisting in that and asking for that investigation, to be fair, and to be thorough as everyone deserves," Avila said.
As they seek justice, they're also looking into ways to memorialize Lay. Right now, Equality Florida and his friends are exploring avenues like a bench, marker, or even renaming the park in his honor. It's also a display that shows the LGBTQ community is still fighting for justice.
"He was discharged from the Navy [because] an officer found out he was gay," Tommy said. "We went to the March on Washington in '93 to support gays in the military. So I'm sure he would be fine being used as a cause for our community."
