Salvatore De Lorenzo was 66 years old when he died on Tuesday, February 12, 2002, according to the Los Angeles Times Homicide Report. According to the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner-Coroner, he died after sustaining blunt force trauma at 912 Alfred Place in Montebello. His death was ruled a homicide, and it is listed as a Montebello Police Department case.
He was well known in Montebello as the owner of a popular restaurant called Salvatore's. Times news stories about his killing were dated February and March 2003 and gave his age as 67, a year later than the Homicide Report, and that difference could not be resolved from the records available. The coroner's record lists him as Latino, while the Times described him as "a kind Italian immigrant who often extended his hand to those in need."
According to the first Times report, patrol officers went to his home on Alfred Place after "receiving a call about a suspicious vehicle in the neighborhood." The car was registered to De Lorenzo. Officers found his body "in a pool of blood" just after midnight, and he "appeared to have been bludgeoned on the head," police said. One report placed his body in his garage and a later one in his house.
A month later, police asked the public for help finding a man seen shopping with De Lorenzo in the hours before he was killed. Security video showed the two at a Target store and a T-shirt shop on Whittier Boulevard in the City of Commerce, and De Lorenzo "may have been shopping for the modestly dressed man." Police believed a man seen near the crime scene was the same person. Investigators determined that De Lorenzo knew the man, "possibly through his restaurant," said Det. Robert Carcano of the Montebello Police Department, who called him "someone we would like to speak with." Police did not call him a suspect. They described him as a Latino man of about 25, about 5 feet 8, of average build, with thick, wiry, parted hair and a round, clean-shaven face, and said he may have been a Mexican citizen.
"He was an immigrant. He always opened his arms to helping people," his son, Anthony De Lorenzo, told the Times. "My father didn't deserve this." Carcano said De Lorenzo "was known to help out employees who needed a hand."
Montebello is a city east of East Los Angeles, between Monterey Park, Pico Rivera and Commerce. It is a largely residential city of single-family homes on hilly streets, with a long-established Armenian community and a large Latino population. Whittier Boulevard runs through the city and on into Commerce, lined with shops and restaurants. Montebello has its own police department, which investigates homicides in the city.
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 Salvatore De Lorenzo 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 ate at Salvatore's, who worked for him, or who recognizes the man described by police may hold information that could help. Even a small detail, such as a name overheard, a vehicle seen nearby or a conversation remembered, can help detectives move a case forward. The Times reports asked anyone with information to call the Montebello Police Department at 887-1252. Anyone with information can contact the Montebello Police Department, or leave an anonymous tip with Crime Stoppers at 800-222-TIPS.
