In his last hours alive, Dominic Luna drove home.
He made it there, driving north from Reseda until he reached the driveway of his family’s Tehachapi home. But he never made it inside.
The first to find him was his mother, Kristen Luna, peering through the kitchen window out to his car. She noticed him through the car’s tinted glass by the emblem on his shirt. She panicked.
Dominic died of a fentanyl overdose. He was 24.
Between late 2020 and 2023, Dominic struggled with substance abuse. His addiction led him to homelessness, sleeping at Lion’s Park in Costa Mesa and near the Gaucho Beach shoreline restaurant in Long Beach, a city where his family lived for 20 years.
It’s in those same places where Kristen has found comfort, retracing the path of her lost son at his lowest points, and offering love and supplies to those struggling there today.
Kristen, her mother and volunteers — many of whom are mothers and friends of those struggling with addiction — gathered on Sunday at Gaucho Beach, splitting off into two parties that either walked along the shoreline sidewalk leading to the convention center or along the beach path. Most interactions were brief, just handing off a bag and exchanging pleasantries. Other times they sat and spoke with people, and occasionally joined in a group prayer.
The idea for the group came to her sometime after Dominic returned from his last round of treatment in August 2023. He was on board immediately, she said, and he agreed to help whenever they got started. His death in November 2024 meant he never got the chance.
Now, Kristen’s resolve is to carry on the idea without him. With several crates of paper bags, she’s begun traveling to different cities in California, searching out homeless encampments to hand out supplies.
She understands a bag of food, toothpaste and other basics can only go so far. It won’t offset skyrocketing rents or replace structured treatment. It won’t end homelessness. It won’t bring back her son.
But, “this whole project is giving me a will to live again,” she said. “If I could help even just one person out here, not die and call their mom and reconnect, and connect with God, or recover, whatever. That’s it. One soul saved.”
The group, Love is Free Foundation, is still small but already mighty, with a flow of donated goods and a band of parents-turned-activists fighting the deadly drug crisis.
Their goal is to visit three cities a year, with Lancaster, Palmdale, Antelope Valley and Bakersfield all as potential next stops.
In the process, she’s met others like herself — mothers, sisters, aunts also dealing with loss.
One mother, Kristy Kastler, lost her 28-year-old son Devin a few months after Dominic’s death. At one point, she met the dealer being tried for Devin’s wrongful death. She struggled to describe what it felt like, seeing the woman in the courtroom.
“It was an out of body experience,” she said.
She spends a lot of time on a podcast centered around the impacts of fentanyl overdoses and parental grief, and giving speeches to local high schools. It’s painful to see other parents going through what she experienced. “There’s no comfort in it,” she said.
Kristen would rather people remember her son at his best. “He was a super cool dude, and was my best friend,” she said.
Dominic was a Long Beach alum, starting with Lowell Elementary, then St. Cyprian Parish School, and later attending Wilson High School. He was a member of the school surf team, a frequent rider at Orizaba Skatepark and a lover of regular kid things, like Roblox, reading and dragons.
Through his travails, he always carried a copy of “The Hobbit.” Torn and battered, it stayed by his side through the throes of addiction, Kristen said. She thinks he kept it as a link to his youth and a time when he was happy. It’s now buried with him.
“It’s a miracle The Hobbit survived his whole adventure,” She remembers thinking. “This is going with him to the grave.”