Josiah Ray Williams was just 1 year old when he died on Thursday, April 16, 2015. According to the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner-Coroner, he died after sustaining blunt force trauma, and the coroner's records placed the injury in the 9000 block of Sepulveda Boulevard in Westchester, near Los Angeles International Airport. His death was ruled a homicide, and it is listed as an Inglewood Police Department case.
The Los Angeles Times Homicide Report described what happened in the days before his death. At about noon on Sunday, April 12, paramedics responded to a call about an unconscious child at an urgent care center. They reported that Josiah had shallow breathing and bruising on his body. Paramedics took him to a hospital, where doctors determined that his injuries were non-accidental. Days later, he was pronounced dead.
That evening, police and doctors questioned Josiah's parents, and the accounts they gave, as reported by the Times, did not fully line up. His mother said that two weeks earlier Josiah had fallen on his head at a park and hit a metal crate, and that he had been taken to the hospital and released. His father said he picked Josiah up from the mother on April 10 and everything was fine. However, when he took the child back the next day, he said, Josiah did not want to return to his mother. The mother said Josiah was fine when his father picked him up but was acting strange and breathing hard when he returned.
Those statements describe a short window, roughly April 10 to April 12, in which the boy moved between two households. Neither parent was named in the report, and neither was accused of anything. "No arrests were made," according to an Inglewood Police Department spokesman. The Times did not report any later developments.
The record does not explain why the Westchester location appears in the coroner's records while the case was assigned to Inglewood police, whose city lies just east of Westchester. It may reflect where the urgent care center or a residence was, but that is not stated.
Westchester is a residential and commercial neighborhood on the Westside, bordered by Los Angeles International Airport and home to Loyola Marymount University. Sepulveda Boulevard is its main north-south artery, lined with shops, offices, hotels and medical buildings. Inglewood, next door, is a largely residential city with its own police department.
When a very young child dies from injuries that doctors judge to be non-accidental, the case often turns on who was caring for the child in the hours and days before. Relatives, neighbors, babysitters or friends who saw Josiah in that period may know whether he seemed well and who he was with.
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 Josiah Ray Williams could be found in news archives or public records. More than ten years later, there is no public sign that anyone has been held responsible. Anyone who saw Josiah Ray Williams between April 10 and April 12, 2015, or who knows how he was injured, may hold information that could help investigators. 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 Inglewood Police Department, or leave an anonymous tip with Crime Stoppers at 800-222-TIPS.
