Fermin Pagaling was 56 years old when he died on the morning of Wednesday, January 3, 2007, in Carson. According to the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner-Coroner, he died of stab wounds at 503 W. 219th St. His death was ruled a homicide, and it is listed as a Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department Homicide Bureau case.
The Los Angeles Times Homicide Report listed him as "a 56-year-old Asian male" who "died Wednesday, Jan. 3, after being stabbed in Carson." A separate roundup on the Times' Homicide Report blog, published at the end of January 2007, said that "Fermin Pagaling, a 56-year-old man of Filipino descent, was stabbed to death at 503 W. 209th St. and died at 10:28 a.m. Jan. 3." The two entries give different street numbers, 219th Street and 209th Street, and the public record does not explain the difference.
The coroner-based listing gives 219th Street.
In April 2008, more than a year after his death, GMA News Online published an article by Pasckie Pascua of the Philippine News about Filipino Americans who had died violently in the Los Angeles area. It opened with Fermin's name, listing him first among four Filipinos who "met gruesome deaths" in 2007. The article said that "Pagaling, 56, was stabbed to death at 503 W. 209th St under broad morning light on January 3." It did not report a motive, a suspect or any arrest, and it did not quote his family.
Beyond those accounts, little about Fermin's life has been made public. No obituary, memorial page or family fundraiser for him could be found. The record does not say what he did for a living, who he lived with, whether he knew the person who stabbed him, or whether he was attacked inside a home or outside on the street. That he was killed in the middle of the morning, in a residential part of Carson, raises the possibility that someone nearby saw or heard something, but no witness account has ever been made public.
Carson is a city in the South Bay region of Los Angeles County, incorporated in 1968. It is home to California State University, Dominguez Hills, and to the stadium complex now known as Dignity Health Sports Park. The city has a large Filipino American community, along with Latino, Black, Samoan and other communities, and much of it is made up of single-family neighborhoods mixed with industrial areas near the freeways and refineries. Carson contracts with the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department for police services, which is why the Sheriff's Homicide Bureau handled the case.
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 Fermin Pagaling could be found in news archives or public records. More than 18 years later, there is no public sign that anyone has been held responsible. A 56-year-old man was stabbed to death in daylight in a Carson neighborhood. Anyone who lived on or near West 219th Street or West 209th Street in Carson in January 2007, or who knew Fermin through work, church or the local Filipino community, may remember something about that morning. 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 (8477).
