Damian Medina was 20 years old when he died early on Saturday, March 16, 2019, in East Los Angeles. According to the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner-Coroner, he died of stab wounds near Whittier Boulevard and South Rowan Avenue. His death was ruled a homicide, and it is listed as a Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department case.
The Los Angeles Times Homicide Report described him as "a 20-year-old Latino male" who "died Saturday, March 16, after being stabbed in East Los Angeles." A KTLA report published the next day, under the headline "Man Killed in East Los Angeles Stabbing Identified," said that "Damian Medina of Los Angeles died in the 2:25 a.m. attack in the 4000 block of Whittier Boulevard," citing the county medical examiner's office. Only that opening portion of the report was available for this story.
The only other public trace of his death is a funeral listing.
A memorial page on the Dignity Memorial site says that Damian Medina "passed away on March 16, 2019" and that he was in the care of Funeraria del Angel in Pico Rivera. The page invites visitors to leave messages for his family, but no written obituary or account of his life appears in the material available for this story.
Much remains unknown. The public record does not say whether he was attacked by a stranger or by someone he knew, whether he was alone or with friends, or whether the stabbing followed an argument. It does not say whether he died at the scene or later at a hospital, or whether deputies identified a suspect. What is known is that the attack happened in the middle of the night on one of the best-known streets in the area, at an hour when bars and late-night businesses close and people are often still outside.
Damian Medina is a fairly common name. Searches turn up athletes, men in other states and obituaries for older men, none of whom can be connected to this death. At 20, he was barely an adult, and the people who knew him best may have been classmates, coworkers, cousins or friends from the neighborhood.
East Los Angeles is an unincorporated community just east of the city of Los Angeles, policed by the Sheriff's Department. It is a dense, largely residential area with a long history as a center of Mexican American life and culture in Southern California. Whittier Boulevard is its main commercial street, lined with shops, restaurants, bars and businesses, and it is famous for its decades-long history as a cruising strip. Rowan Avenue is one of the streets that cross it.
Hundreds of people are killed in Los Angeles County every year, and a large share of those killings end without an arrest.
No arrest, criminal charge or court case connected to the death of Damian Medina could be found in news archives or public records. More than six years later, there is no public sign that anyone has been held responsible. Anyone who was on or near Whittier Boulevard and Rowan Avenue in East Los Angeles in the early morning hours of March 16, 2019, or who knew Damian Medina and where he had been that night, may hold information that could help detectives. Even a small detail, such as a name overheard, a vehicle seen nearby or a conversation remembered, can help detectives move a case forward. Anyone with information can contact the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department Homicide Bureau at 323-890-5500, or leave an anonymous tip with Crime Stoppers at 800-222-TIPS.
