Dalila Meza was 19 years old when she died on Friday, December 6, 2002, in Commerce. According to the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner-Coroner, she died after sustaining blunt force trauma on Slauson Avenue, about 1,200 feet west of Eastern Avenue. Her death was ruled a homicide, and it is listed as a case of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department.
The Los Angeles Times Homicide Report recorded her death in a single sentence drawn from coroner's records. It gave her age, listed her as a Latina woman, described the location on Slauson Avenue and noted the cause of death. A website that republishes coroner's information adds a few details. It gives her date of birth as February 18, 1983, which means she had turned 19 less than ten months before she died, describes her as having "Died on a Street," and lists the cause of death as "Multiple Traumatic Injuries." No news story about her death appears to have been published.
Beyond those few lines, almost nothing about Dalila Meza has been made public. No obituary, memorial page or family fundraiser could be found for this story. She surely had family and friends who remember who she was, but none of that has entered the public record. Her name is not rare, and searches for it mostly returned living women in Southern California, Texas, North Carolina and Latin America who share it.
Because so little has been released, even the basic circumstances remain unknown to the public. The record does not say whether she was beaten, attacked by someone she knew or by a stranger, or struck by a vehicle. The location, a stretch of a major road rather than a home address, together with a finding of multiple traumatic injuries, is consistent with several possibilities, including a vehicle collision, but the coroner's ruling of homicide is the only official judgment that has been made public. The record does not say what time she was hurt, whether anyone saw what happened, or whether investigators ever identified a suspect.
Commerce is a small city southeast of downtown Los Angeles, incorporated in 1960 and known mostly for industry. Large stretches of it are taken up by warehouses, factories, trucking yards and rail facilities, and it is home to the Citadel Outlets shopping center and the Commerce Casino. Relatively few people live there compared with the number who work there or pass through. Slauson Avenue is one of the main east-west roads across southern Los Angeles County, carrying heavy truck traffic through this industrial corridor, and Eastern Avenue is a major north-south street. Commerce has no police department of its own and contracts with the Sheriff's Department for law enforcement.
Hundreds of people are killed in Los Angeles County every year, and a large share of those killings end without an arrest.
No arrest, criminal charge or court case connected to the death of Dalila Meza could be found in news archives or public records. More than 23 years later, there is no public sign that anyone has been held responsible. Anyone who was on Slauson Avenue near Eastern Avenue in Commerce in early December 2002, or who knew a 19-year-old woman named Dalila Meza, 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.
