Monee Andrea Givens was three years old when she died on Sunday, August 7, 2005. According to the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner-Coroner, she died after sustaining blunt force trauma. Her death was ruled a homicide. The Los Angeles Times Homicide Report lists the case under the agency code ACU, which refers to the Los Angeles Police Department's Abused Child Unit, the detectives who investigate the deaths and serious injuries of young children. The public record does not give an address for where she was hurt.
The Homicide Report, which draws on coroner's records, lists her as a Black girl and gives no other details. No news story about her death could be found.
A memorial listing on Find a Grave gives her full name and her dates: born November 22, 2001, and died August 7, 2005. That means she was three years and about eight months old. The listing places her burial in the Hollywood Hills area of Los Angeles County. No written obituary, photograph caption or family names appear in the saved excerpt, and no memorial page or family fundraiser could be found. Her name is uncommon, and no other record of her short life turned up.
Because so little has been released, even the basic circumstances of her death remain unknown to the public. The record does not say where she was when she was hurt, who was caring for her, whether she died at home or at a hospital, or whether investigators ever identified anyone responsible. When a young child dies of blunt force trauma, detectives typically examine the child's medical history and the accounts of every adult who cared for her, and such cases can take months to build. None of those steps in this case have been made public.
The assignment to the Abused Child Unit suggests that she died within the city of Los Angeles, though the record does not say in which neighborhood. The city covers nearly 470 square miles, from the San Fernando Valley to the harbor, and the unit's detectives handle cases from all of it.
At three, Monee would have been talking, playing and learning the world around her. She would have been getting ready for preschool, and people beyond her immediate family, such as neighbors, babysitters or relatives, would likely have known her by name. Her life was cut short before she could begin school, and her death has passed almost without public notice.
Los Angeles still recorded roughly 480 to 520 homicides a year in the mid-2000s, and many of those killings were never solved.
No arrest, criminal charge or court case connected to the death of Monee Andrea Givens could be found in news archives or public records. More than 20 years later, there is no public sign that anyone has been held responsible. Anyone who knew Monee or the people caring for her in the summer of 2005, or who saw or heard something that worried them at the time, 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.
