The family of slain University of Colorado student David Parrish remembered him today as a young man with a wry sense of humor, an impeccable dresser and a person who appreciated and respected the cultures of the world.
Parrish was shot Wednesday in Mexico when he attempted to thwart the armed robbery of his mother, CU-Boulder lecturer Janet Graaff, in Puerto Vallarta, where they had gone over CU’s spring break.
The family said in a statement that David, born in Boulder and a graduate of Dawson Middle School in Lafayette and Boulder High School, was a person who relished seeing the world, understanding other cultures and photographing the people and places he visited.
He was a junior in the geography department at CU and was on the dean’s list for academic excellence with a 4.0 grade-point average.
“He never wished to hurt a soul, and he was a friend to all,” said the family. “Truth with humor and kindness, justice with love and fairness, and beauty in all things — these were David’s principles and how his family will remember him.”
Parrish traveled extensively, including to Europe, southern Africa, Japan, Thailand, Morocco, Costa Rica, Canada and Mexico.
His family said he always had a good sense of humor that continually entertained his many friends and that he also had a keen sense of aesthetics, “which lives on in the many photographs he has left us.”
They said his sense of dress also was impeccable. “He will be remembered by his family and close friends for his rather unusual collection of shoes and fastidious attention to how and when each pair would be worn or simply kept on display,” said the family.
Parrish was an avid fan of Denver sports teams — the Nuggets, Broncos and the Rockies — and was an athlete himself. He was captain of the tennis team at Boulder High School and also enjoyed working with weights, biking, golf and pickup games of basketball.
The family noted that in the spring semester of his sophomore year, Parrish studied abroad in Morocco, where he was based in Rabat and traveled extensively throughout the North African country.
In Morocco, he met Lina Cohen of Los Angeles, and the two developed a relationship that continued up until the time of his death.
A memorial service and reception honoring Parrish will be at 2 p.m. Friday at St. John’s Episcopal Church, 1419 Pine St., in Boulder.
In addition to his mother, Parrish is survived by his father, Stephen, of Boulder; his sister, Lesley, who is attending Colgate University in New York; his paternal grandparents, Graeme and Grace Parrish, Cambridge, N.Y.; and his maternal grandparents, Jannie and Clare Graaff, of Cape Town, South Africa.
The family suggests that contributions be made to any organization that provides “new, lightly used or reconditioned shoes” to the less fortunate.
In Mexico, a Puerto Vallarta prosecutor said Monday that a Mexican judge who issued the release order for one of the suspects in Parrish’s killing is being sought.
Prosecutor Guillermo Martin Diaz said the judge, his secretary and two jail employees are suspected of playing an active role in helping Alfonso Ramirez walk out of a Puerto Vallarta jail early Friday. Diaz said officials want to know why the judge and his secretary issued a release order and the two jail employees let Ramirez go, all before dawn.
The city’s public-safety director also has been suspended without pay during the investigation.
The murder suspects were identified as Ramirez and Daniel Vargas, both 30.
Lynn Roche, public affairs officer for the U.S. consulate in Guadalajara, Mexico, said the U.S. consul general in Guadalajara on Friday sent a letter to the Mexican secretary for public security addressing “our concerns in the case and what had happened.
“They know of our interest that they reapprehend the person who is no longer detained,” said Roche.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Howard Pankratz: 303-954-1939 or hpankratz@denverpost.com
