Alfredo Hector Leon was 39 years old when he died on Thursday, May 14, 2020, in the Pico-Union neighborhood of Los Angeles. According to the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner-Coroner, he died of stab wounds near 1817 W. Pico Blvd. His death was ruled a homicide, and it is listed under the agency code CBH, which appears to refer to the Los Angeles Police Department's Central Bureau Homicide unit.
The Los Angeles Times Homicide Report described him only as "a 39-year-old Latino male" who "died Thursday, May 14, after being stabbed near 1817 W. Pico Blvd. in Pico-Union." That single sentence, drawn from coroner's records, is nearly all that has been made public about his death.
Beyond his name, his age and the place where he died, almost nothing about Alfredo Hector Leon 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 stabbed during a fight or a robbery, attacked by a stranger or by someone he knew, or hurt indoors or on the street. 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.
Alfredo Leon is a common name. Searches turn up a documentary filmmaker, a television news producer, a grandfather remembered in a family fundraiser after a long illness, and obituaries for men in several other states. None of them can be connected to this death on Pico Boulevard, and that crowd of namesakes has made it even harder for any trace of this particular man to surface.
Pico-Union is a densely populated neighborhood just west of downtown Los Angeles, named for the intersection of Pico Boulevard and Union Avenue. It is one of the oldest residential areas of the city, with older apartment buildings, small shops and Victorian-era houses on some side streets. Pico Boulevard is one of the long east-west corridors of Los Angeles, and the stretch through Pico-Union is lined with storefronts, restaurants and apartments, with foot and bus traffic at most hours of the day.
Los Angeles recorded about 260 homicides a year in 2018 and 2019, among the lowest yearly totals in more than half a century, yet many of those killings still went unsolved.
The death came during the first months of the COVID-19 pandemic, when stay-at-home orders had emptied many streets and businesses across Los Angeles.
No arrest, criminal charge or court case connected to the death of Alfredo Hector Leon could be found in news archives or public records. More than five years later, there is no public sign that anyone has been held responsible. Anyone who was on or near West Pico Boulevard in Pico-Union in May 2020, or who knew a 39-year-old man named Alfredo Hector Leon who lived or spent time there, 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.
