Ventura homeless
John Stephen Wood, a homeless carpenter who was born and raised in Ventura, takes an ashtray from church volunteer Kathy Powell. Caseworkers have tried over the years to give him assistance, but he rejected their offers. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)
John Stephen Wood, a 46-year-old homeless man known to friends as “Woody,” sits in his Ventura motel room where he is recovering from a Feb. 1 attack in which he was beaten with a baseball ball and stabbed multiple times. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)
John Stephen Wood shows his head wounds. “They just clocked me in the melon,” he says of attackers. “But they couldn’t keep me down.” (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)
John Chavez, left, Roque Garcia, right, and a third homeless man who didn’t give his name sit in Ventura’s Plaza Park. They say recent attacks on the homeless worry them. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)
John Stephen Wood, whose head bears the marks of a Feb. 1 attack in which he was beaten with a baseball bat and stabbed, is recovering in a Ventura motel room that was paid for by church donors. (Brian van der Brug / Los Angeles Times)