RANCHO CUCAMONGA >> Donnie Reed, his cousin, and some friends were hanging out in a parking lot after a night of playing pool early Sunday when they heard yelling from across the lot.

That’s when they saw several people harassing a homeless man.

“He was just pushing his shopping cart through the parking lot and they were calling him racial slurs,” said Reed’s 33-year-old cousin, who withheld his name out of concern for his safety. “They were just looking for a fight.”

Reed diverted their attention away from the homeless man, but then became a victim himself.

A man, who was with the group harassing the transient, allegedly pulled out a knife and stabbed Reed in the chest. A woman with Reed’s group was punched in the eye.

One of Reed’s friends was stabbed in the back of the neck when he came to the woman’s aid.

San Bernardino County sheriff’s deputies received a call at 2:25 a.m. about the stabbing in the 8900 block of East Foothill Boulevard, according to sheriff’s spokesman Randy Naquin.

Reed was pronounced dead less than an hour later at San Antonio Community Hospital. His friend was in stable condition.

Naquin had no further information and no arrests had been made by Monday evening.

Reed’s family and friends were still coming to grips with the loss on Monday.

Reed’s wife, Jenny, said she had to explain to her three children that their father wasn’t coming home. She said she wants to see an arrest.

“I want them to stand in front of my kids and explain why they took their dad’s life,” she said.

Donnie Reed and his friends had gone to see an Ontario Reign hockey game before going to Stix Sports and Grill on Vineyard Avenue late Saturday.

Jenny Reed said she called her husband about 1 a.m. Sunday to ask him what time he’d be coming home.

He told her he didn’t know, so she decided to go to sleep.

The group stayed until closing, and then went out into the parking lot to talk.

Another group of around three men and one woman were also outside, they had reportedly been inside the Sixty 6 Sports Lounge, Reed’s cousin said.

That group confronted someone in the parking lot, but witnesses don’t suspect it led to a fight. When Reed and his friends approached, they saw the group surrounding a homeless man.

“Donnie said, ‘Hey, knock it off. He’s not hurting anybody,’” his cousin said.

They began to argue, and during the argument, a man stabbed Reed and his friend.

“There were no blows exchanged. This guy stabbed two people and ran off,” Reed’s cousin said.

They drove away in a white Jeep Cherokee.

Amid the chaos, Reed’s wife woke up and tried to call her husband because he hadn’t come home.

“He didn’t answer his phone, and his friend didn’t answer his phone either,” she said.

Reed, a Rancho Cucamonga native, was a 1991 graduate of Etiwanda High School. He married Jenny, his childhood sweetheart, several years later and worked for a plumbing restoration company.

Reed was an avid NASCAR fan and took his family to see races at the Auto Club Speedway in Fontana every year. He also enjoyed darts, poker and excelled at pool.

Jenny Reed said he never spoke about the homeless, but she wasn’t surprised that he tried to intervene, given his generous nature.

“He would give you his last dollar,” she said.

His cousin said he just didn’t want to see the homeless man get jumped.

“We were trying to do a good deed for somebody else,” he said. “We weren’t trying to start a fight — we were trying to de-escalate it and get everybody to go home.”

Anyone with information may call Detective Daniel Hanke or Sgt. Trevis Newport, (909) 387-3589. People wanting to remain anonymous may call WeTip, 800-78-CRIME.

Reed’s family has established a fund to assist with funeral costs.