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Friday, January 29th, 2016  |  USD: Buy 531.29 / Sell 543.92
20 years

US man murdered in San Jose identified as popular Playas del Coco expat

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(Facebook photo)

(Facebook photo)

August 21st, 2015 (ICR News) The body of an American man that was dumped from a moving vehicle in San Jose with a gunshot wound to the back of the head on Wednesday is believed to be that of Steven Grimshaw, a California native and popular and well-known expat who lived in Playas del Coco, Guanacaste, where he owned a hostel, sources with knowledge of the situation tell ICR News.

 

While police officials have yet to release the victim’s name to the press, ICR News has obtained sufficient information to identify the man as Steven Grimshaw, believed to be in his mid-50′s, rather than his mid 40′s as previously reported.  ICR News was informed that the family of the U.S. citizen has been notified.

 

Residents of Playas del Coco describe Grimshaw as a kind, well-liked man in the northern Pacific beach community. Grimshaw regularly sang karaoke at Coconutz on Tuesday night, a popular bar-restaurant in town.   Dan Kososki, Coconutz’s proprietor, told ICR News by telephone that Grimshaw was popular with his patrons and staff, who had come to expect his weekly karaoke performances.

 

An unofficial source that prefers to not be identified tells ICR News that Grimshaw responded to an advertisement on Craigslist for a car for sale in San Jose and was carrying between $5,000 and $7,000 USD in cash in hopes of purchasing the vehicle on the day he was murdered.

 

Grimshaw’s body was dumped from a moving vehicle near the stoplights on the Circunvalación beltway in San Jose’s Hatillo 7, shortly before 3:30 p.m. on Wednesday.  Grimshaw had a gunshot wound to the back of the head.

 

Residents who live on the side street where the U.S. man’s body was dumped described seeing a green sedan fleeing the scene at a high rate of speed towards the Circunvalación, according to La Nacion.

 

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  • Ben

    I want to first say this is very sad. I met steve a while back and he was very nice to my family from the US that visited Coco with me. Steve helped us change a flat tire on my truck. Great guy. This story is getting more and more common in beach towns and in San Jose. Everyday i hear stories from buddies from the US and Canada that get things stolen and have a bad experience in Costa Rica. Costa Rica is now getting to be like El Salvador and Mexico for crime. I spend only 6 month in CR now and send 6 month in Panama and feel my much safer in Panama now. Police in Panama seem much more on top of things than Costa Rica. I go to San Jose once a week and notice alot more people sleeping on the streets and have seen some crime happen. Costa Rica is a mess and i am very sad when things like this happen to people that want a nice life.
    Costa Rica is in a bad spot becareful your life means more than a few dollars be aware or people in Costa Rica thing are getting messy.

    • Michele Salsbury Moore

      I’ve known him almost 20 years. There are a lot of heavy hearts today in two different countries.

      • Heather Lane

        I’m so sorry, Michele.

  • Chris Thomas

    Tourists please stay away from Costa Rica the country is extremely dangerous and no one will help you in case of a crime not even your local embassy, CR is lawless and is the wild west

    • EXPATINCR

      That is a very bold statement!! Do you have the data to prove every word you are saying?? I really doubt it!!

      • Chris Thomas

        Go to google put tico times Costa Rica no longer safe. If you cannot deny that is not a safe place then you must be a dumb blind sheep or have a lot of money in tourism at stake.

        • EXPATINCR

          Really see that it is obvious that you don’t see the real world and just rely on printed material. I have lived here for 8 years and what you are saying is nothing but BS.

          • Chris Thomas

            Really the stats are all engineered many crimes go unreported, I lived there for 25 years, it used to be a good country now you can get kill for a cell phone watch channel 7 the local news every day

          • EXPATINCR

            So now Chris, are you still saying that the entire country is dangerous?? That the entire country is lawless? That you are advising everyone not to come here?? Is that what you are saying Chris??? We all know that because of the extremely high demand for drugs in the US, there is a pipeline from north to south along both the Caribbean and Pacific coasts of many Central American countries – Is the impact of this on you related to your bogus statements? Do you blame the government of CR for these problems? God, I really hope not!!!

          • JeannieDC

            I would rather live in CR than the USA!! Any day!! And I do!!!!

          • EXPATINCR

            Now, we have someone with some sense of the real world. Glad to have you here :-)

          • JeannieDC

            Well we had the same thing happen in Canada a guy was killed trying to sell his truck on Craigs List ,,So is Canada a hell hole to live too!!! Shit happens sad but true …

          • EXPATINCR

            Things like that happen all over. CR is not the only place, but you are correct – something like that does not make that place an unsafe place to live. Some of the stuff I heard earlier today reminds me of the guy who told everyone that Costa Rica was too expensive to live, and that all should reconsider moving here. Do you know what he based this statement on? – The cost of a McDonald’s hamburger!!! Yes, I could not believe it either. Oh well!
            .

          • zzzzz

            Ha! same here

          • Carol Knapp

            I agree, ExPat.

    • Ryan Melania Deaver

      You can come just don’t let the beach atmosphere put your awareness to sleep. Get some Heat or bring it over oiece by piece and let it bark a few times for the “wildlife” & they’ll leave you alone. Everyone loves a long fruitful life and the risk is not worth the reward messing with “dog owners”.

      Pura Vida

    • Carol Knapp

      Do you live here? Have you been here? Or, as I suspect, you are basing your statements on what you’ve read. I doubt if San Jose is any more dangerous than New York or downtown L.A.

      • Chris Thomas

        Another dumb blind sheep

  • NorthendFool

    I see these kids from our town Hone Creek carrying guns and working for the drug dealers. They were children when i first met them, now they are thugs. No more for me. Puerto is now a good place to die. I found a place in nica and i think im going to buy it.

    • Joop Breeschoten

      We left last year. Very good decision !

      • Karen Mata

        Loved CR, but 20 years after first arriving moved south in 2011.

    • M G

      Nicaragua is even more lawless! especially for outsiders

      • Anthony

        Tell it to the Economist.
        http://www.economist.com/node/21543492

      • duke ster

        You better believe Nicaragua is more lawless! I can tell you that from being picked up in a taxi, Kidnapped,beaten, tied up, knifed , robbed and almost, a.l.m.o.s.t. KILLED!!!!!! Nicaragua is 1 thousand times worse than C.R. !!!! STAY AWAY FROM NICARAGUA!!! Once you are there you will be a GIANT target !!! This happened outside a nice bright mall on a sunny Sunday afternoon. If you can’t even get in a taxi without being kidnapped–then what can I say? Anyone will tell you–go to “loneyplanet.com” ( a popular travelers website) and read about taking a taxi in Nicaragua. I should have done this but I didn’t because I was returning from a Tractor/Trailer trip from Grecia to Guatemala . We took 2 tractor trailers full of chatara ( scrap metal) from Grecia to Guatemala to be smelted in the furnace there,since Guatemala has the only scrap metal furnace near Costa Rica. The trip showed me the real central America. Sleeping under the trailers in a hammock at truck stops. Going through DANGEROUS border crossings at night-where we had to sleep in the tractors overnight while waiting for the slow paperwork to be processed at the borders. This is the REAL DEAL if you ever want to see how the truck drivers travel through all the countries. It was so dangerous that after crossing into Guatemala the robbers would jump up on the trailers and throw pieces of metal off to their waiting friends. I mean it was like Mad Max. The only way to go through Guatemala successfully in these tractor trailers is to hire guards at the border–the guards will shoot off the thieves–leave them to die if they weren’t killed outright. I walked across several borders with no problems–it was a wild trip but I had to return alone ( for reasons I won’t go into here) THAT is why I was unaware of the taxi situation in Nicaragua–again… A VERY DANGEROUS AND LAWLESS COUNTRY !!!

    • jahjan

      do you think Nic is safer? Aren’t more people there living in poverty than in CR?

  • papi parks

    I can hear vacuum efect from Americans leaving so sad after all these years have not learned to take care of business owners our tourists. So sad.

  • Aitor Xaranga

    Sad tale which confirms the common knowledge that you do not answer this type of ads without a thorough check of who is behind it. This is one of many murders under similar circumstances.
    Carrying cash for a sweet deal is too dangerous

    • duke ster

      Yeah, just think about it. Showing up to a meeting with someone he didn’t know with a HUGE amount of cash in a lawless Central American country. What was he thinking?

  • Ken Morris

    Craiglist kind of says it all.

  • Ryan Melania Deaver

    Ben in Costa Rica they don’t care about American or anybody else for that matter. Just look at the tico discounts and helping one another no matter the situation. Sorry but if you live in C.R. you’re on your own 98% of the time. Basically you’re just a gringo $ sign, $6000 in hand alone in a foreign town in a foreign country is a definite no no.

    Guy was tripping
    RIP

  • Ginger Morris

    First this is indeed sad. But some of us leave our Brains at the Airport.
    Would you have done that in N.Y. Chicago, Miami? Would you have carried cash? Would you have had a friend drive with you? IT is like a Bind Date. We have lived here for 10 years and don’t live in the cities in the USA or Costa Rica. Crime in everywhere in the world. This ONE incident does not warrant an Exodus. In our town of Grecia/ San Miguel we have never heard of a murder here. That is why we live out from the city or rich areas like Escazu. http://www.CostaRicaMountainHome.com

  • duke ster

    So sad, I really feel sad for this poor guy and his loving friends and family. Everyone here on ICR speaks of him being such a nice guy.
    The same type of thing happened to me, this nice guy dropped his guard, just as I did when I almost lost my life. We both got a little too comfy here in Central America and we must be on our guards AT ALL TIMES !!

    Sad but if you want to live here you must realize you are living in…THE LIONS DEN !!!.
    This was probably the work of outsiders,or demon possessed druggies who have lost their souls, who knows but the killers certainly are cold hearted. This man was drawn into the Hatillo neighborhood, well known as a dangerous area. And then to be cowardly shot in the back of his head,then callously dumped onto the cold hard asphalt streets…man o man.
    These are my personal thoughts and so are beyond criticism–they are mine and I am not pushing them on anyone:
    I hope he knew Jesus Christ as his personal savior, Then he is even now in the crowd of God’s children, singing praises to God and enjoying heaven forever.For none of us know the exact second when we will leave this temporary world, described in the Bible as our lives being as a vapor, here and then gone –poof. I hope he had readied himself for his last trip.

  • Ben

    This story has pissed off some people i hear that there is planned protest soon coming expect big numbers.

  • Carol Knapp

    After living in L.A. for 30 years in a nice home in the hills with a view of downtown I don’t feel any more unsafe here in Playas del Coco than I did there. I was burglarized 3 times back home but here I live in a gated community with 24/7 guards. I also don’t feel “hated”. I have found the locals to be welcoming and friendly, especially as I speak Spanish. Would I run around alone at night in San Jose with a bunch of cash? Of course not, but I wouldn’t in any big city. The U.S. has a better equipped police force, but L.A.’s biggest thieves are the city “officials” and their developer cronies if one is a property owner.

  • duke ster

    I know I put down Costa Rica a lot but in the end –we all wish it were better here–I mean it was a nice place for awhile.. Just sooo sad. This poor guy–I really feel so bad about this happening and I know everyone else does too. If this happened in the USA it wouldn’t be quite as shocking but for this kind of thing to happen here where we all try soo hard to believe that it is nice here and such a special place. You know this guy probably got complacent because he probably felt so safe in his town and always surrounded by up beat travelers and his local friends. He probably had a real special life where he lived and forgot how mean it can be out there. I am sure he had really good friends in his town and the locals treated him good. I know where I used to live the locals all knew me and they would always smile and wave and I never had those good feelings in the USA. I mean where I could walk everywhere and run into friendly faces and everybody taking the time to shoot the breeze. The ticos usually made me feel welcome in my town and like I said–where ever I went I ran into friendly faces. BY and large a friendly bunch of Ticos for sure. I can see how he felt so safe in his town that he just forgot and went out with a friendly attitude. but San Jose can be really rough, like any big town.

  • Suzanne Calhoun

    Steave was a friend and a good man. His death is so sad and a good reminder that we should all be careful. I believe that Steve was lured to this deal by someone he knew otherwise, he wouldn’t have been son careless. Steve would be upset with all this talk about how horrible Costa Rica is to live in. He loved being here. We need to honor his memory by being more diligent of our surroundings and making safer choices.

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