Dispatch: ‘I think about him every day’
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Joseph Aldama, 24, had been missing for two days when authorities found his body wrapped in a blanket in an alleyway near Atlantic and Carlin Avenues in Lynwood on Dec. 15, 2006. He had a single gunshot wound to his forehead.
The eldest of five children, Joseph acted as his mother’s right hand, cooking, doing handiwork and keeping the house tidy. He had left home on the evening of Dec. 13, 2006, to go drinking at a friend’s house.
Last week, his parents John, 52, and Maria, 51, joined other families who lost sons to violence at Lynwood Park for a vigil organized by “Drive by Agony,” a group established to support the victims of violent crimes and their families.
For the Aldamas, the memories of the days surrounding their son’s killing remain vivid. Maria — wearing a T-shirt imprinted with her son’s picture, birth date and date of death — stood in the corner of a small community room at the park. She sobbed as her husband sat on a stool looking at the floor.
Friends said Joseph was drunk the last time they saw him, Maria explained. When he didn’t come home that night his parents worried. Although their son had never been in trouble with the law, they thought that police had picked him up for public intoxication. The next day the Aldamas’ concerns turned to fear when a friend of Joseph’s called to let them know that his car had been found abandoned.
At 4 a.m. on Friday, Dec. 15, unable to wait for her son’s return, Maria scoured the streets and alleys of Lynwood looking for him. Later, she learned that she had unknowingly passed by her son’s body in her frantic search.
About 11:30 a.m., detectives came to the Aldama’s house to notify the family that they had found Joseph’s body. His sister Crystal was the only one there. She called her father at his job and he came home to wait for his wife to return from work at 3 p.m.
When Maria arrived he told her: “They found Joseph, but not alive.”
John met with detectives to identify his son’s body. They showed him a picture of Joseph’s face, trying to cover up the gunshot wound to the head. John told them: “Let me see his whole face.” The image of Joseph’s wounded face has stayed with him to this day. Even during his wake, when Joseph’s injury was patched, his father could still see the gunshot wound on his head. John said: “I knew it was there.”
More than two years have gone by since Joseph was shot to death. “It feels like it happened last week,” his father said. “I think about him every day.”
Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays, the days of the week Joseph was missing and then found dead, are especially tough. “It’s like I’m going through it all over again. Every Friday is a bad Friday,” John said.
His son, he said, was ‘not a troubled kid. He wasn’t in gangs.’ On the contrary, he involved himself in the city by coaching baseball at Lynwood Park, and was known by many members of the community.
The Aldamas, whose lives have changed greatly since their son’s killing, continue to honor Joseph’s memory. While he was alive, Joseph began building a shrine to St. Mary in front of the family house. After Joseph’s death, neighbors Javier and Josie Ramirez finished the project. Now alongside Mary, sits a picture of a cake Joseph made for his father on his 50th birthday, a memory John holds dear. Maria keeps a picture of Joseph on her nightstand, and she talks to him every day.
No arrests have been made in connection with Aldama’s killing. Los Angeles County sheriff’s Det. Karen Shonka, who is heading the investigation, said she believes the friends last seen with Joseph know the circumstances surrounding his death. Anyone with information is asked to contact the L.A. County sheriff’s Homicide Bureau at (323) 890-5500.