Stabbing victim found off Angeles Crest Highway Christmas Eve was reported missing from San Bernardino in 2012
The identity of a woman whose body was discovered Sunday afternoon near Angeles Crest Highway about 4 miles north of La Cañada Flintridge has been identified as 21-year-old Raylynn Josephine-Deanne Hernandez, a coroner’s spokesman confirmed Wednesday.
While the victim’s city of residence has yet to be confirmed, Hernandez’s name and date of birth have been confirmed as matching a missing person’s report issued by San Bernardino Police Department in 2012.
The report indicates the then-16-year-old Hernandez had last been seen on May 25, 2012. She was described as having brown eyes and dyed red hair, in addition to star tattoos on her left wrist and the name ‘Leyla’ with two hearts tattooed on her right forearm.
Lt. Mike Madden, a spokesman for the San Bernardino Police Department, said the missing person’s report was last issued on Sept. 8, 2013.
“On Dec. 30, 2014, we were notified by the Ventura County Sheriff’s Department that she’d been located and, by that point, she had been declared an emancipated minor,” Madden said Wednesday. “We removed her from the missing person’s system. That was our last communication.”
According to a release issued Sunday night by the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department Homicide Bureau, a hiker was walking near Angeles Crest Highway at around 1:30 p.m. Sunday and saw Hernandez’s body near Mile Marker 30.45.
Investigators said the victim had sustained multiple stab wounds and had been apparently dumped off a steep hillside just off the road.
Los Angeles County Assistant Chief Coroner Ed Winter confirmed Wednesday the body was that of Hernandez. She was pronounced dead at the scene at approximately 2:23 p.m. An autopsy indicating the official cause of death was still pending as of press time, Winter said.
Hernandez would have turned 22 on Jan. 10.
Anyone with information about the incident is asked to call the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department Homicide Bureau at (323) 890-5500.
Twitter: @SaraCardine
