Roger Daniel Young Jr. was 62 years old when he died on Sunday, June 29, 2014. According to the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner-Coroner, he died after sustaining blunt force trauma. His death was ruled a homicide, and it is listed as a case of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department's South Los Angeles Station.
The coroner's records describe him as a Black man, 62 years old, who carried his father's name. Beyond his name, his age and the place where he died, almost nothing about Roger Daniel Young Jr. 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. He surely had family, friends or neighbors who remember who he was, but none of that has entered the public record. His name is a common one, and searches for it turned up only other men who share it, among them a well-known television director and men named Roger Young whose obituaries were published in Iowa, Louisiana, Nebraska and other states.
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, whether anyone saw what happened, or whether investigators ever identified a suspect. Unlike most entries in the Los Angeles Times Homicide Report, his record does not even give an address or a neighborhood. It lists only the date, his age and the Sheriff's station that took the case, which leaves open where he was hurt and where he lived.
The Sheriff's Department's South Los Angeles Station patrols unincorporated communities in the southern part of Los Angeles County that have no city government of their own and depend on the county for policing. These are mostly working-class residential areas of small single-family homes and apartment buildings, crossed by busy commercial streets, where many families have lived for decades.
His age stands out. Most homicide victims in Los Angeles County are young men, and a man in his 60s who dies of blunt force injuries may have been hurt in any number of ways, and the record does not say which. Hundreds of people are killed in Los Angeles County every year, and a large share of those killings end without an arrest. The death of a 62-year-old man in the Sheriff's South Los Angeles patrol area does not appear to have been reported by any news outlet.
No arrest, criminal charge or court case connected to the death of Roger Daniel Young Jr. could be found in news archives or public records. More than 11 years later, there is no public sign that anyone has been held responsible. Anyone who knew Roger, or who lived in the unincorporated neighborhoods served by the Sheriff's South Los Angeles Station in June 2014 and remembers an older man being hurt, 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 Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department Homicide Bureau at 323-890-5500, or leave an anonymous tip with Crime Stoppers at 800-222-TIPS.
