SAN CLEMENTE : Public’s Help Asked in Identifying Victim

Police are asking for the public’s help in identifying a young man who died Sunday morning after being struck by a car Saturday night at the I-5 immigration checkpoint--the sixth pedestrian death at the federal post this year.

“We’re asking the public to lend us a hand so we can return his body to the family,” said Lt. Bob Rivas of the Orange County Sheriff’s Department, “so he can be buried appropriately among family and not be lost and buried as a John Doe.”

Rivas described the man as Latino, 5-foot-5, about 20 years old, weighing about 140 pounds with black hair and brown eyes. The man was wearing a long-sleeve, plaid, cowboy-style shirt and a royal blue down jacket bearing a patch showing the Earth and the word “Explorer.” He wore a pair of white canvas Converse high-top shoes and a fake gold Pierre Cardin watch.

The only identifying mark is a two-inch scar on his left elbow.

Anyone with information should call the Orange County coroner’s office at (714) 647-7410.

The man was struck about half a mile south of the checkpoint about 9:30 p.m. Saturday. He was hospitalized and died at 2:47 a.m. Sunday.

In the last several years, a number of immigrants have been struck and killed while crossing the freeway to avoid the immigration checkpoint. Police say they are still not sure whether the victim was in the country illegally, but officials at the coroner’s office said he was carrying a small amount of Mexican currency--about 1,500 pesos.