Alumnus left for dead after beating in Old City

Family, friends search for answers in the Old City beating and killing of an alumnus.

A 2010 alumnus, Kevin Kless, was killed early Saturday, Jan. 14 after being beaten on the steps of the Second Bank of the United States on Chestnut Street.

Police said Kless was trying to pick up a cab when he shouted at a taxi. After the taxi briefly stopped, three men came out of a passing car and beat Kless. National Park Service rangers responded initially and administered first aid to Kless, who was pronounced dead later that night.

The 23 year-old graduated with a degree in risk management and insurance and had recently returned to Philadelphia to start a job with the insurance broker Marsh.

“He got a really good job out of school,” risk and insurance management professor Michael McCloskey said. “He just moved on to a different job with a different company which was in another good position.”

Kless was active on Main Campus and was a member of Gamma Iota Sigma, a fraternity for students in the risk management and insurance field.

“He was a really good student in our risk management insurance program,” Dr. R.B. Drennan, chairman of the department of risk, insurance and healthcare management, said. “He was a very active member of our student professional organization…and he was a good ambassador of our program. He did well when he was here and did all the right things in terms of getting himself ready to have a successful career in the risk management insurance world.”

McCloskey, who is a faculty adviser for Gamma Iota Sigma, said that Kless was in the process of figuring out what direction he was headed in when his life was cut short.

“I think that like a lot of students in our program, his future was definitely in the insurance industry,” McCloskey said. “I think he was just trying to gain some experience and figure out where he was headed. The company he was working for when he died, Marsh, is the world’s largest insurance broker, so as far as having a real strong career ahead of him, he was definitely headed in the right direction.”

The three assailants are still at large.

Sean Carlin can be reached at sean.carlin@temple.edu.