Tuliven May Mejia-Velasquez was 37 years old when he died on Thursday, February 28, 2013, in Exposition Park. According to the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner-Coroner, he died after sustaining blunt force trauma at Halldale Avenue and Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard. His death was ruled a homicide, and it is listed as a Los Angeles Police Department Southwest Area case.
The Los Angeles Times Homicide Report recorded only the basic facts of his death: his name, his age, the date, the intersection and the cause. It did not publish a story about him, a quote from a detective or a description of what happened, and no other news report about his death could be found.
Beyond his name, his age and the place where he died, almost nothing about Tuliven May Mejia-Velasquez 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 unusual, and that makes the silence around it all the more striking. Mejia and Velasquez are both common surnames, but the given names Tuliven May are rare enough that a search for them should turn up almost anyone who carried them. Searches found nothing at all beyond the Homicide Report entry. It may be that his name was spelled differently in other records, or that he was known to friends by another name.
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.
Exposition Park is best known for the park of the same name, home to the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, the California Science Center and its space shuttle Endeavour, and the California African American Museum. The University of Southern California sits just to the north. Around those landmarks lies a residential neighborhood of older homes and apartment buildings. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard is a major east-west street, and on game days and during large events the area fills with visitors, while on ordinary days it is a quieter, working-class part of South Los Angeles.
By the mid-2010s Los Angeles was recording roughly 250 to 300 homicides a year, among the lowest totals in decades, yet many of those killings still went unsolved.
No arrest, criminal charge or court case connected to the death of Tuliven May Mejia-Velasquez could be found in news archives or public records. More than 12 years later, there is no public sign that anyone has been held responsible. Anyone who was near Halldale Avenue and Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard in late February 2013, or who knew a 37-year-old man by this name or a similar one, 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 call the Los Angeles Police Department at 877-527-3247 or leave an anonymous tip with Crime Stoppers at 800-222-TIPS.
