Autopsy of Slain Boys Finds No Clues

SAN DIEGO — Two boys, targets of a frantic search by family members before their bodies were discovered beside the Otay River this week, died of strangulation, the county medical examiner here said Wednesday.

The official autopsy results offered no other clues into the mysterious double homicide that has baffled detectives and panicked parents and school officials in the South San Diego neighborhood where the boys were last seen Saturday afternoon, riding their bicycles.

The bodies of Jonathan Sellers, 9, and Charles Keever, 13, were discovered Monday by a bicyclist, who spotted them near a trail in underbrush along the banks of the Otay River, about a quarter-mile west of Interstate 5.

San Diego Police Department spokesman Dave Cohen said homicide detectives were focusing Wednesday on the crime scene and on 15 to 20 transients who live in an encampment under a nearby bridge.

Several of the homeless people were brought in for questioning after police discovered they had outstanding arrest warrants, Cohen said.

Elayne Poston, Jonathan Sellers’ aunt, said Wednesday she had been told by Jonathan’s four siblings that squatters under the bridge constantly threaten children who ride their bikes through the area, sometimes threatening them with death.