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Slain Pasco man chose to live in remote, ramshackle shack

Staff photo by LISA A. DAVIS

David P. Cutshaw lived in this shack that used to be an office for a salvage yard.

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By LISA A. DAVIS | The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 5, 2009

Updated: 11/05/2009 04:26 pm

HUDSON - A grassy winding road runs off of Oak Drive and leads to a faded yellow shack tucked in the woods that few would want to call home.

But it was here David P. Cutshaw lived off and on throughout the years, and according to those who knew him, he wouldn't have had it any other way.

Cutshaw's body was found on the ground outside the small building late Tuesday. Though Pasco sheriff's detectives won't say exactly what killed him, an autopsy performed Wednesday at the Pinellas-Pasco Medical Examiner's Office determined the 66-year-old's died from homicidal violence.

Sometime after dark Tuesday, Amy Reyburn, 38, drove up the road behind their mobile home at 10027 Oak Drive to bring Cutshaw some medicine.

"We check on him periodically. He's been very sick," her husband Donald Reyburn, 43, said Wednesday.

When Amy came back less than 10 minutes later, though, she was startled, he said.

"She came back in ghost white," he recalled. "She said, 'Babe, he's dead.' I said, 'What do you mean he's dead?' 'He's dead and his head is bleeding."

She called 911 and that's when the investigation began.

About noon Wednesday, a fire pit in front of the shack still smoldered. A shovel rested on rocks surrounding the ashes. Nearby was what appeared to be a burned-out bus or RV, a boat, a broken bicycle and other abandoned vehicles.

The front door of the shack was wide open. Inside was filthy, littered with dirt, bugs and little cigar butts. It reeked of urine. In the main room a dirty bed was pushed against the wall and a pair of cowboy boots and a red and white Igloo cooler were set among the debris and grime. One room was stuffed from ceiling to floor with mostly old carpets.

Back outside, a shed with only three walls looked like it had seen more activity recently. A soiled pillow and comforter were tucked into a corner. A bag of hamburger buns, a Thermos, a jug of water and a can of Pringles were set inside. So was deodorant, car seats and Gatorade.

Bill Tamasy owns the 2-acre property where Cutshaw's body was found. Some years ago, he said, he gave Cutshaw permission to live in the shack that once used to be an office when he owned the adjacent metal salvage yard.

He said he's known Cutshaw for 30 years when he used to buy junk cars off of him. Cutshaw had been married and has at least one son who is in prison. For many years Cutshaw lived in the woods in west Pasco County, Tamasy said, but he didn't have to be homeless.

"He just didn't want responsibilities. He said in the woods he didn't have any," Tamasy recalled.

Cutshaw lived off of his Social Security check which mostly went to beer, acquaintances said.
By all accounts, he was a big drinker.

Pit Patel works as a clerk at the A-1 Discount Beverage store on Hicks Road, not far from the shack in the woods.

Each day, Cutshaw would go in alone and routinely purchase a four-pack of Natural Ice beer "sometimes one; sometimes two" and a pack of Remington Little Cigars, Patel said.

Cutshaw made his last trip to the store between 4 and 5 p.m. Tuesday, he said.

Hours after deputies and forensic investigators converged on the shack in the woods, there seemed to be no hint of what had happened the night before except for some stickers on the stairs that perhaps marked where perhaps evidence once lay.

Under the shack's stairs empty cans of Natural Ice were strewn about.

There was no crime-scene tape, no latex gloves and no Cutshaw. Just a single folding chair sat empty next to the stairs.

Reporter Lisa A. Davis can be reached at (727) 815-1083.

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