Fredrick Don Callaway was 67 years old when he died on Saturday, December 20, 2003, in the South Park neighborhood of South Los Angeles. According to the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner-Coroner, he died after sustaining blunt force trauma at 656 E. 50th St. His death was ruled a homicide, and it is listed as a Los Angeles Police Department Newton Division case.
His entry in the Los Angeles Times Homicide Report, which draws on coroner's records, is only a few lines long. It gives his name, his age, the date, the address on East 50th Street and the finding of blunt force trauma, and it identifies him as a Black man. Nothing more about how he died was ever published there.
Beyond his name, his age and the place where he died, almost nothing about Fredrick Don Callaway 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. The name Fredrick Callaway, with that spelling, is not common, but every match found in searches for this story belonged to someone else, including men of the same name in 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. A man of 67 can be badly hurt by a single blow or a fall during a struggle, but nothing in the public record says what happened to him.
South Park is a neighborhood in South Los Angeles named for the public park at its center, a recreation ground that has long served local families. The area is made up mostly of modest single-family houses and small apartment buildings on long, straight residential streets, with stores and services along the major avenues. East 50th Street is one of those residential streets, a block where neighbors would likely have known an older man who lived or spent time nearby.
Los Angeles still recorded roughly 480 to 520 homicides a year in the mid-2000s, and many of those killings were never solved. The death of a 67-year-old man on a residential street in South Los Angeles does not appear to have drawn any news coverage at the time, and no later account of the case could be found.
No arrest, criminal charge or court case connected to the death of Fredrick Don Callaway could be found in news archives or public records. More than 22 years later, there is no public sign that anyone has been held responsible. Anyone who lived on or near East 50th Street in South Park in December 2003, or who knew Fredrick Callaway and remembers his last days, may hold information that could help detectives. 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.
