Bernardo Alejandro Salazar was 24 years old when he died on Sunday, March 15, 2009, in Koreatown. According to the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner-Coroner, he died after sustaining blunt force trauma at 3073 W. 8th St. His death was ruled a homicide, and it is listed as a Los Angeles Police Department case.
The Los Angeles Times Homicide Report recorded his death in a single sentence: Bernardo Alejandro Salazar, "a 24-year-old Latino male," died that Sunday "after sustaining blunt force trauma in Koreatown, according to Los Angeles County coroner's records." The entry gave no account of what happened to him and did not name an LAPD division or a detective, and no follow-up appears to have been published.
Beyond his name, his age and the place where he died, almost nothing about Bernardo Alejandro Salazar 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.
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.
Bernardo Salazar is a common name, and searches turn up many other men who share it, including older men whose obituaries appear in Colorado, Texas and New York, a fashion designer in New York, and a man whose family raised money in 2022 to return his body to Guatemala. None of those records is connected to the young man who died in Koreatown in 2009, and that makes the trail harder for anyone trying to learn more about him.
Koreatown is one of the most densely populated neighborhoods in Los Angeles, lying west of downtown and centered on the Wilshire Boulevard corridor. It is known for its apartment buildings, late-night restaurants, bars and karaoke rooms, and its streets stay busy well into the night. Eighth Street is one of the neighborhood's east-west streets, lined with apartment buildings and small businesses. In a neighborhood that crowded, it is likely that someone heard or saw something on the day Bernardo Alejandro Salazar was hurt, even if they did not realize at the time what it meant.
Homicides in Los Angeles fell steeply in the late 2000s and early 2010s, yet many killings from those years were never solved.
No arrest, criminal charge or court case connected to the death of Bernardo Alejandro Salazar could be found in news archives or public records. More than 16 years later, there is no public sign that anyone has been held responsible. Anyone who lived in or visited the buildings near 8th Street in Koreatown in mid-March 2009, or who knew a 24-year-old man named Bernardo, may hold information that still matters to his family. Friends, coworkers or roommates may know where he had been and who he was with in his last days. 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.
