Marcos Raul Novoa was 36 years old when he died on Saturday, March 27, 2021, in Highland Park, a neighborhood in Northeast Los Angeles. According to the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner-Coroner, he died after sustaining blunt force trauma near 1061 North Avenue 50. His death was ruled a homicide, and it is listed as a Los Angeles Police Department case.
Novoa was a Latino man in his mid-30s. Beyond his name, his age and the place where he died, almost nothing about him has been made public. No obituary, memorial page or family fundraiser could be found for this story, no news outlet reported on his death, and no LAPD news release about it could be found. His family and friends surely remember who he was, but none of that has entered the public record.
Because so little has been released, even the basic circumstances remain unknown to the public. The record does not say whether he was beaten in a fight, attacked by a stranger, assaulted indoors or on the street, or struck by a vehicle, all of which can lead to a finding of blunt force trauma. It does not say what time of day he was hurt, whether he died at the scene or later at a hospital, or whether anyone saw what happened. It does not say whether police identified a suspect.
Avenue 50 is one of the main north-south streets in Highland Park, running from the Arroyo Seco up into the hills, crossing Figueroa Street and York Boulevard along the way. The neighborhood is one of the oldest in Los Angeles. For decades it was a working-class, largely Latino community, and in the years before his death it had become one of the city's best-known examples of gentrification, with new restaurants, galleries and rising rents along Figueroa and York. The blocks around Avenue 50 mix older bungalows and small apartment buildings with long-time family homes. Highland Park is policed by the LAPD's Northeast Division.
The city of Los Angeles recorded 397 homicides in 2021, the most since 2006, according to the Los Angeles Times. Many of those killings were shootings that drew at least brief coverage on local television. The beating death of a 36-year-old man on a residential street in Highland Park, early in that violent year, did not. With no public description of what happened, it is the kind of case that can easily fade from view.
No arrest, criminal charge or court case connected to the death of Marcos Raul Novoa could be found in news archives or public records. More than four years later, there is no public sign that anyone has been held responsible for his death. Neighbors near Avenue 50 may remember a disturbance, an ambulance or a police response on that Saturday in late March 2021, and anyone who knew him may hold information that could help. Anyone with information can call the Los Angeles Police Department at 877-527-3247 or leave an anonymous tip with Crime Stoppers at 800-222-TIPS.
