Dominic John Depetro was 52 years old when he died on Friday, June 15, 2018, in Lancaster. According to the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner-Coroner, he died of stab wounds in the 43700 block of Ponderosa Street. His death was ruled a homicide, and it is listed as a Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department case, with the Homicide Report naming the agency as "LASD Lancaster."
The Los Angeles Times Homicide Report recorded his death in a single sentence drawn from coroner's records. It described him as "a 52-year-old white male" who "died Friday, June 15, after being stabbed in Lancaster." The entry gave only a block number, not a street address, and it did not say whether that block was where he lived, where he was found or where he was attacked. No news story about the killing appears to have been published.
Beyond his name, his age and the place where he died, almost nothing about Dominic John Depetro 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.
His surname is uncommon and is often spelled DePetro. Searches for it turn up obituaries from other families, in Michigan and in the San Fernando Valley, that list relatives named Dominic DePetro, but none of those records can be tied with certainty to the man who died in Lancaster, so they are left aside here. At 52, he would have had decades of family ties, friendships and work behind him, and the people who knew him may still remember the summer of 2018.
Lancaster is the largest city in the Antelope Valley, in the high desert of northern Los Angeles County, more than an hour's drive north of downtown Los Angeles. It grew up around the railroad and farming, and later around the aerospace industry and nearby Edwards Air Force Base. Today it is a sprawling city of housing tracts, apartment complexes and shopping centers spread across a wide grid of streets, with long distances between neighborhoods. The city contracts with the Sheriff's Department for police services, and deputies from the Lancaster station patrol its streets.
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 Dominic John Depetro could be found in news archives or public records. More than seven years later, there is no public sign that anyone has been held responsible. Anyone who lived on or near Ponderosa Street in Lancaster in June 2018, or who knew a 52-year-old man named Dominic Depetro, 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 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.
