Symeon Gladney was 20 years old when he died on Saturday, Oct. 20, 2001, in South Los Angeles. According to the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner-Coroner, he died of stab wounds. His death was ruled a homicide, and it is listed as a Los Angeles Police Department Southwest Division case. The public record does not give an address or name the neighborhood where he was hurt.
The Los Angeles Times Homicide Report recorded his death in a single sentence drawn from coroner's records. It described him as "a 20-year-old black male" who "died Saturday, Oct. 20, after being stabbed." No follow-up story about his death appears to have been published.
One public memorial does exist. A Find a Grave page lists a Symeon Bujould Gladney, born in 1981 and died in 2001, which fits his age, and its text repeats the Times entry about the stabbing and asks whether anyone has information to share about his life.
The page gives his full middle name, Bujould, an unusual name that may help relatives or old friends recognize him. Beyond that, no obituary, family fundraiser or news story about him could be found, and nothing has been made public about his schooling, his work or the people closest to him. His first name is an uncommon spelling, and searches for it turned up no other trace of him.
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.
He was 20 years old, barely an adult. Young men of that age in Los Angeles are often still living with parents or relatives, finishing school, starting jobs or looking for work, and they usually have wide circles of friends from their neighborhoods and schools. Some of those friends are now in their mid-40s, and some may remember the weekend in October 2001 when he died.
The Southwest Division covers a large part of South Los Angeles west of the Harbor Freeway, including the area around the University of Southern California and Exposition Park, Jefferson Park, the Crenshaw district, Baldwin Village and Leimert Park. It is a mix of quiet residential blocks of single-family homes, apartment buildings and busy commercial streets. Because the coroner's record gives no address, it is not known which of these areas was the scene of his death.
Homicides in Los Angeles rose sharply in the early 2000s, climbing past 600 in 2002, and detectives carried heavy caseloads. Many killings from those years were never solved.
No arrest, criminal charge or court case connected to the death of Symeon Gladney could be found in news archives or public records. More than 24 years later, there is no public sign that anyone has been held responsible. Anyone who knew Symeon Gladney in South Los Angeles, or who heard about a stabbing in the Southwest Division area around Saturday, Oct. 20, 2001, 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 (877-LAPD-24-7), or leave an anonymous tip with Crime Stoppers at 800-222-TIPS (8477).
