Rosbita Toledo Varsena was 39 years old when she died on Saturday, March 1, 2014, in Valley Glen, in the San Fernando Valley. According to the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner-Coroner, she died of stab wounds in the 7100 block of Coldwater Canyon Avenue. Her death was ruled a homicide, and it is listed as a Los Angeles Police Department North Hollywood Division case.
According to Ed Winter, the assistant chief of investigations for the coroner's office, it was members of her own family who found her. "Family members found Varsena in a home and called police," the Los Angeles Times reported. She was pronounced dead at 11:15 a.m. The record does not say whether the home was her own, how long she had been there before she was found, or what the family saw when they arrived.
Within days, detectives had a name. The Times reported that detectives were looking for a man they described as a person of interest in her death.
Police did not publicly call him a suspect, and no record could be found showing that he was ever located, arrested or charged. The public record does not say how he was connected to Rosbita, whether he knew her, or why detectives wanted to speak with him.
Her death also reached City Hall. In March 2014, the Los Angeles City Council took up a motion by Councilmembers Jose Huizar and Mitchell Englander relative to an offer of a reward for information leading to the identification, apprehension and conviction of the person or persons responsible for her murder. The council records found for this story do not state the amount of the reward. Such rewards are usually offered when detectives believe that someone in the community knows something they have not yet shared.
Beyond those facts, little about Rosbita's life has been made public. No obituary, memorial page or family fundraiser could be found, and her name appears online almost entirely in short listings copied from the Los Angeles Times Homicide Report and in the city's council records. One line of the Times entry spells her surname as Versena, a variation that may make other records harder to find. She surely had family, friends and coworkers who remember her, but none of that has entered the public record.
Valley Glen is a residential neighborhood in the central San Fernando Valley, between North Hollywood, Van Nuys and Sherman Oaks. It is home to Los Angeles Valley College, and its streets mix single-family houses with apartment buildings along the busier avenues. Coldwater Canyon Avenue is one of the long north-south roads that cross the Valley, lined in many places with apartments and small businesses.
By the mid-2010s Los Angeles was recording roughly 250 to 300 homicides a year, among the lowest totals in decades, yet many of those killings still went unsolved.
No arrest, criminal charge or court case connected to the death of Rosbita Toledo Varsena could be found in news archives or public records. More than 11 years later, there is no public sign that anyone has been held responsible. Anyone who knew Rosbita, who lived near the 7100 block of Coldwater Canyon Avenue in early March 2014, or who knows where the person detectives wanted to question went after her death, may hold information that could help detectives. The Times listed LAPD North Hollywood detectives at 623-4075. 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.
