On the night of April 22, 2000, 71-year-old Alfonso Vigil was found dead on the kitchen floor of his apartment at the Clara Park Commons in Cudahy after neighbors forced their way in to fight a deliberately set fire. Smoke alarms alerted residents just before 7:45 p.m.; by the time the patio door was opened and the smoke cleared, Vigil was already deceased. An autopsy revealed he had been attacked and later identified the cause of death as strangulation, and the Los Angeles County coroner's records list the case as a homicide investigated by the LASD Homicide Bureau.
Vigil was a longtime, blind resident originally from Albuquerque who had moved to the Los Angeles area about 30 years earlier. He was remembered by family and neighbors as an outgoing, musical man — a saxophone and trumpet player who had worked at various jobs including as a therapeutic masseur and a salesman before retiring. Residents of the gated Clara Park Commons described the community as secure; Vigil often moved about with a walking cane and used a community shuttle, and neighbors said his friendliness made his violent death especially shocking.
Sheriff's homicide detectives told reporters they had little to go on: there were no witnesses, no known suspects or clear motive publicly released, and investigators were uncertain whether the killing resulted from a home invasion or an invited guest who turned violent. At the time of the news coverage authorities appealed to the public for information and asked that anyone with knowledge contact the sheriff's homicide detectives. As of the most recent records and contemporary news reporting located, there is no public record of an arrest, charge or resolution in Vigil's killing.
The case remains unsolved; no arrests or charges were reported in the sources reviewed. Tips or information were requested by LASD Homicide detectives at 890-5500 in the original reporting.
