Lynn Elyn Hollinger was 54 years old when she died on Thursday, June 6, 2002, in West Covina, a city in the San Gabriel Valley east of Los Angeles. According to the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner-Coroner, she died of stab wounds at 200 N. Grand Ave. Her death was ruled a homicide, and it is listed as a West Covina Police Department case.
The Los Angeles Times Homicide Report recorded her death in a single sentence drawn from coroner's records. It described her as "a 54-year-old white female" who "died Thursday, June 6, after being stabbed in West Covina." The entry gave a street address on North Grand Avenue, but it did not say whether she lived there, whether she was attacked there or whether that was simply where she was found. No follow-up story about her death appears to have been published.
Beyond her name, her age and the place where she died, almost nothing about Lynn Elyn Hollinger has been made public.
No obituary, memorial page or family fundraiser could be found for this story, and no news outlet appears to have reported on the death. She surely had family, friends or neighbors who remember who she was, but none of that has entered the public record. Her middle name, Elyn, is unusual, and Hollinger is not a common surname in Southern California. Yet searches return only other people named Lynn Hollinger in Pennsylvania, Texas, Georgia, Illinois and elsewhere. None of them can be connected to the woman who died in West Covina.
Because so little has been released, even the basic circumstances remain unknown to the public. The record does not say whether she was stabbed during a fight or a robbery, attacked by a stranger or by someone she knew, or hurt indoors or on the street. It does not say what time of day she was hurt, whether she died at the scene or later at a hospital, whether anyone saw what happened, or whether investigators ever identified a suspect.
At 54 she had lived most of her adult life. Nothing in the record says whether she had a husband or children, what kind of work she did, how long she had lived in the San Gabriel Valley, or who was left to mourn her.
West Covina is a suburban city of roughly 100,000 people in the eastern San Gabriel Valley, crossed by the San Bernardino Freeway. It grew rapidly after World War II, when former walnut groves and farmland gave way to tracts of single-family homes, and today it is largely residential, with shopping centers such as the Plaza West Covina mall and busy commercial boulevards. The city has its own police department, which investigates homicides within its borders.
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 Lynn Elyn Hollinger could be found in news archives or public records. More than 23 years later, there is no public sign that anyone has been held responsible. Anyone who knew a 54-year-old woman named Lynn Hollinger in West Covina, or who was near North Grand Avenue in early June 2002, 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 West Covina Police Department, or leave an anonymous tip with Crime Stoppers at 800-222-TIPS (8477).
