Sharon Anne Santos was a 30-year-old Filipino American woman whose disappearance in August 2004 ended in a devastating murder investigation in Los Angeles, California. Born on November 2, 1973, Sharon lived in Burbank and worked as a financial analyst for Warner Bros. Entertainment. Friends and family remembered her as an adventurous, outgoing person who enjoyed traveling, painting, skydiving, and taking flying lessons. She had also studied volcanoes in Hawaii. Her life was filled with ambitions and experiences, making her sudden disappearance especially troubling to those who knew her.
On August 17, 2004, Sharon was last seen leaving her workplace at Warner Bros. Studios in Burbank. She reportedly returned to her apartment at the Scott Villa Apartments complex in the 1500 block of Scott Road before vanishing. When she failed to report to work for two consecutive days without contacting anyone, her employer became concerned. On August 19, a call was placed to her sister, who contacted the apartment manager and requested that someone check on Sharon. The manager entered the apartment and discovered that Sharon's purse and cellular phone were still inside, but Sharon was nowhere to be found. Her unexplained absence prompted a missing-person investigation by the Burbank Police Department.
For more than two weeks, investigators searched for Sharon while her family and friends desperately hoped she would return safely. Vigils were organized, and police interviewed neighbors, coworkers, friends, and acquaintances in an effort to reconstruct her final known movements. The disappearance was considered highly unusual because Sharon had no apparent reason to abandon her responsibilities or disappear without notifying anyone. Despite extensive efforts to locate her, investigators initially struggled to establish what had happened.
On September 2, 2004, the search ended tragically when investigators discovered Sharon's body inside the trunk of her black Honda Accord, which had been abandoned along the 700 block of New Depot Avenue in Los Angeles' Chinatown neighborhood. The vehicle had apparently been parked there for several days, and nearby residents reported noticing an increasingly disturbing odor. Parking citations had accumulated on the vehicle, and information obtained through a law enforcement database helped lead investigators to its location. Sharon's remains were badly decomposed when discovered, complicating the initial examination. The Los Angeles County Coroner's Office initially could not determine the precise cause of death and ordered additional toxicological and microscopic examinations. Subsequent court records established that Sharon died from strangulation. Although September 2 became the recorded date associated with her death, it was the date her body was discovered, and the precise time of the killing was not publicly established.
The investigation eventually focused on Eriberto "Eddie" Rodriguez, a maintenance worker at Sharon's apartment complex. Rodriguez was a convicted felon and registered sex offender who had worked at the property for approximately two and a half years. Detectives discovered that he had access to apartment keys and had committed burglaries involving other units in the complex. On February 17, 2005, Burbank police executed search warrants at several locations associated with Rodriguez. Investigators recovered jewelry and electronic equipment, including property stolen from apartments. A ring belonging to Sharon, which had disappeared from her apartment before she went missing, was among the items discovered in Rodriguez's possession.
Rodriguez was arrested in February 2005 on allegations involving residential burglary, sexual battery, and possession of a firearm by a convicted felon. Although authorities identified him as a person of interest in Sharon's murder, they emphasized that the arrest concerned other criminal offenses and that he had not been charged with killing her. Investigators continued examining whether his conduct, access to Sharon's apartment, and possession of her property could establish a connection to her disappearance and death.
Additional evidence emerged through subsequent civil court proceedings. Witnesses testified that Rodriguez had made sexually inappropriate remarks about Sharon shortly before her disappearance. One witness described a conversation in which Rodriguez referred to Sharon as dead before her body had been discovered. Another witness reported seeing a man abandon Sharon's vehicle in Chinatown. The man's clothing resembled the maintenance uniform Rodriguez wore, but the witness could not conclusively identify him. Investigators also learned that the location where Sharon's vehicle was abandoned was near a bus route connecting to the area of her apartment complex. These circumstances raised serious suspicions, but they did not establish Rodriguez's criminal responsibility for the murder.
The investigation also exposed disturbing details about Rodriguez's previous offenses. He had sexually assaulted other women, including a woman who worked cleaning apartments at the Scott Villa complex. In March 2006, Rodriguez pleaded no contest to multiple criminal charges, including residential burglary, sexual battery, false imprisonment, and assault with intent to commit rape and other sexual offenses. He received a 12-year prison sentence. However, those convictions arose from crimes unrelated to Sharon's homicide, and he was never convicted of causing her death.
Seeking accountability, Sharon's mother, Edna Santos, filed a wrongful death lawsuit in 2006 against Scott Villa Apartments and Francis Property Management. The lawsuit alleged that the property owners had negligently hired Rodriguez despite his criminal history and had failed to protect residents from a dangerous employee. The companies had not conducted a criminal background check before employing him, and his work gave him access to tenants' apartments. During the civil proceedings, a retired homicide detective testified that he believed Rodriguez was responsible for Sharon's death, citing similarities between the circumstances of her murder and Rodriguez's previously documented offenses.
In January 2008, a Los Angeles civil jury returned a $12 million verdict in favor of Sharon's mother. The jury determined that the apartment owners and property management company had been negligent, and the verdict reflected the jury's conclusion that Rodriguez was responsible for Sharon's murder. However, the original verdict was subsequently set aside when the trial court granted a new trial because of insufficient evidence supporting the findings. An appellate court upheld that decision in 2010. Further litigation followed, and in 2012 an appellate court reversed a summary judgment that had favored the property owners, allowing the civil claims to proceed. These civil proceedings did not constitute a criminal conviction, and no murder charge against Rodriguez resulted from them.
Despite years of investigation, Sharon's killing remained unresolved. The Burbank Police Department continued reviewing evidence and pursuing possible leads, but investigators had not publicly established a prosecutable case against any individual. At one stage, the city of Burbank, Warner Bros., and the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors combined their efforts to offer a $50,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of those responsible. Nevertheless, the reward and the attention surrounding the case did not produce a successful homicide prosecution.
Twenty years after Sharon's death, her family renewed its public campaign for justice. In November 2024, loved ones gathered in Covina to commemorate what would have been her 51st birthday. Her sister explained that the family continued to live without answers and hoped that advances in forensic technology, particularly developments in evidence analysis, could help investigators uncover information unavailable during the original investigation. Family members also reported that Burbank police periodically reviewed the case, although no significant new developments had been disclosed.
Sharon's loved ones subsequently organized the Justice for Sharon movement and the SHARE Initiative, dedicated to preserving her memory, raising awareness, and pressing authorities to devote additional attention to the investigation. Friends described her as someone whose laughter, generosity, and enthusiasm brought people together. Her family continues advocating for renewed investigative efforts and accountability for the person responsible for taking her life.
More than two decades after Sharon Anne Santos was discovered in the trunk of her abandoned vehicle, her murder remains unsolved. Although Eriberto Rodriguez was investigated extensively, arrested for other offenses, and identified in civil proceedings as a possible perpetrator, no one has been criminally charged, tried, or convicted for Sharon's killing in the available public records. Her family continues seeking answers about the circumstances of her disappearance, the events leading to her death, and the identity of the person who murdered her.
