Dennis Perry, 60, was taken into custody<\/a> near the scene and charged with first-degree premeditated murder. He has been booked into the Duval County Jail.<\/p>\nFollowing the stabbing, News4JAX took a closer look at homelessness in Jacksonville Beach, what resources are available and whether those resources are enough.<\/p>\n
Some residents say they have noticed more people experiencing homelessness in the area.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m seeing the homelessness is just picking up more and more I mean, with where the economy is growing,\u201d said Drake Staten, a Jacksonville Beach resident.<\/p>\n
But others say that doesn\u2019t change how they see the people themselves.<\/p>\n
\u201cHomeless people are people just like us,\u201d said John Miller, a Jacksonville Beach resident.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019re minding themselves and smiling,\u201d Miller added.<\/p>\n
Mission House is the only day center for people experiencing homelessness in Jacksonville Beach.<\/p>\n
Located about a 20-minute walk from the pier, it provides hot meals, clothing, showers and free walk-in medical care.<\/p>\n
Executive Director Lucas Seilhymer says the need has grown significantly in recent years.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn our facility, we\u2019ve seen a large increase in our day services. Two or three years ago we were serving maybe 35 meals, which we do twice a day, seven days a week. As of now, we are seeing 65 per day,\u201d Seilhymer said.<\/p>\n
He says the increase is most likely tied to economic instability, high property costs and people struggling to find affordable housing, as well as a ripple effect from cleanup efforts in other areas.<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of that we believe is just a shift as they continue to clean up downtown and the new state law that is in the books. We\u2019re finding that the people have to go somewhere and a lot of them are coming this way,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Mission House is a day center \u2014 not an overnight shelter. The organization says creating a place where people could stay overnight would require a much larger facility and significantly more funding.<\/p>\n
For those living on the streets, even knowing where to find help doesn\u2019t always mean finding a place to sleep. <\/p>\n
One woman News4JAX spoke with says she has been living on the streets for weeks.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have been living on the streets for four weeks without shelter. I\u2019ve realized the resources and programs, but everybody that\u2019s transparent says that it can be six months to a year before there\u2019s placement into a shelter,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
The City of Jacksonville Beach says it takes concerns involving crimes and violations of state and local ordinances seriously and that the safety of residents is its number one priority.<\/p>\n
The Jacksonville Beach Police Department regularly patrols the beach and pier area to address criminal activity and enforce the law, which prohibits sleeping on the beach. <\/p>\n
Officials say they will continue to monitor the area surrounding the pier and ask residents with concerns to call Jacksonville Beach PD.<\/p>\n
To learn more about the nonprofit Mission House, click here<\/a>.<\/p>\nCopyright 2026 by WJXT News4JAX – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"JACKSONVILLE BEACH, Fla. \u2013 The City of Jacksonville Beach is responding to community concerns following a deadly stabbing…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":377839,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[116,2130,118,117],"class_list":["post-377838","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville-beach","tag-jacksonville-headlines","tag-jacksonville-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/377838","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=377838"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/377838\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/377839"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=377838"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=377838"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=377838"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}