San Diego County CA Archives Obituaries.....Vukalcic, Julie Lee  December 10, 2019
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P Jepsen http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00025.html#0006028 October 17, 2020, 2:46 pm

Published in San Diego Union-Tribune on Jul. 12, 2020
Julie Lee Vukalcic February 26, 1964 - December 10, 2019 San Diego Julie was 
one of four children, including a brother named Gilbert and two sisters - 
Edie, who was five years older than Julie and Judy, Julie's twin, who was 
born two minutes before Julie. Life was not easy for Julie. At one time she 
was an alcoholic, but she recognized the problem and, through the strength 
of her own willpower, was able to stop drinking many years ago. For several 
years she worked with local construction companies, but for the last twenty-
five years of her life Julie was homeless - spending a few nights at a time 
with local friends, or briefly staying in a motel using funds received from 
the government at the first of every month, or incarcerated a night or two 
(with "two hots and a cot") during her alcohol days or, most of the time, 
living on the streets of San Diego, sleeping under a bush, on a vacant lot, 
or under a highway overpass, and spending many daytime hours at Rachel's 
Women's Center. She contracted common street illnesses, had some mental 
issues and, at times, her language would make a drunken sailor blush.In 
2000, Julie was a passenger in a car driven by a friend when they were "T-
boned" by a speeding SUV that ran a red light. The driver of her car was 
killed. Julie was unconscious and subsequently hospitalized while in a coma. 
She underwent several surgeries for serious internal injuries, had a metal 
rod inserted in one leg, and for the rest of her life walked with a severe 
limp. The following year she witnessed a homeless friend beaten to death 
with a 2x4 by another homeless man during a fight over blankets. In the 
ensuing trial, Julie cried as she testified, "I just couldn't understand how 
someone could be like that over a couple of blankets."When I was working 
downtown, she would often come to my office late in the day to enjoy a cup 
of hot chocolate and use a clean restroom; sometimes she just wanted to talk 
and get out of the inclement weather outside. On one occasion, she had a 
cell phone that she had taken from a homeless man who had stolen it. "He 
shouldn't have done that," she said, and asked if we could return the phone 
to its owner. Information on the phone enabled us to do that. Several weeks 
later, she appeared with a laptop computer that the man had stolen. Again we 
were able to find information on the computer that let us track down the 
owner who was grateful for its return. While many avoid people like Julie, 
she was a decent woman with problems. She was intelligent. She was kind. She 
could be very funny and she was a friend, a very good friend who is greatly 
missed.


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