SWARTZ CREEK, Mich. – FBI agents are issuing a warning about dating apps following the murder of a man who was found naked, mutilated and hanging from his ankles in a secret room of a Michigan basement after meeting someone on Grindr.
Kevin Bacon, 25, of Swartz Creek, was mutilated and killed by a man he met on the popular dating app, according to police.
Following Bacon’s murder, FBI agents have an urgent warning about who people are connecting with online.
Bacon worked as a hairstylist at a Flint-area JCPenny. He was last seen by his roommate on Christmas Eve. That’s when he told her he was leaving to meet a man he had connected with on Grindr, police said.
When Bacon didn’t show up for breakfast on Christmas Day, his parents got worried. Around 5 p.m., his father called police to report him missing.
Police said they found Bacon’s car and cellphone in a shopping plaza parking lot near a Family Dollar store. The cellphone contained clues that led them to the home of Mark Latunski, 50, in Shiawassee County, officials said. The home is about 24 miles east of Bacon’s home in Swartz Creek.
On Dec. 28, state police went to Latunski’s home and found a secret room in his basement, according to authorities. They said they discovered Bacon’s naked, mutilated body hanging from the ceiling by his ankles.
Latunski confessed to stabbing Bacon in the back and slitting his throat, police said.
Months before Bacon’s death, police said two other Grindr dates had escaped from that same secret basement. Terrorized, they had run for their lives, police said. One called 911 in the middle of the night, but neither had pressed charges, according to authorities.
Bacon’s parents said they still can’t process his death.
“I hope this wakes everybody up about them because you just never know,” his mother, Pamela Bacon, said.
“Evil does exist, and it touched us,” his father, Karl Bacon, said.
Bacon’s death is fueling new safety concerns about popular dating apps. Michael Glennon, a special agent with the FBI in Detroit, issued a warning about who people talk to online.
“Meet in public,” Glennon said. “I think that’s an important key. Second to that, let somebody know where you’re going and who you’re with, and give them that person’s contact information.”
Latunski is facing one count of open murder and one count of mutilation of a human body, officials said. He’s undergoing a competency evaluation that could take up to three months. He’s being held in jail until then.
FBI officials said about one in 10 profiles on dating sites are fake.