Police Find 2 Bodies Buried Under House

Authorities Monday identified a man who allegedly killed two people whose badly decomposed bodies were unearthed from makeshift graves beneath a house in South-Central Los Angeles.

Los Angeles police detectives identified Alfonso Gabriel Cardenas Lara, 33, as the suspect in the two killings. Lt. John Dunkin, chief of detectives at the LAPD’s Newton Division, said Lara is believed to have fled to Central America.

He was convicted of murder in Nicaragua and had served time there before coming to the United States, Dunkin said. It was not immediately known just when Lara was convicted or when he came to the United States.

The bodies of the victims, believed to be Julia Morales, 52, and her son, Jorge Sarmiento, 34, were dug up Sunday night from a narrow crawl space under a house on East Vernon Avenue.

Morales’ daughter, Londy Massiel Acevedo, reported that her mother and brother were missing when she returned home from work on Sept. 8. Acevedo, Morales and Sarmiento, as well as Lara, Acevedo’s boyfriend, all lived in the small house.

“There was some friction between the son and mother and the boyfriend; to what extent, I’m not entirely certain,” Dunkin said.

Police developed information that led them to believe that the missing mother and son might have been murdered. Detectives searched the home with cadaver-sniffing dogs Oct. 12.

New information led officers back to the scene Sunday. Homicide detectives and coroner’s investigators dug beneath the home, placing the dirt on plastic sheeting in the backyard, until the two bodies were removed. Police said the victims had been bound and gagged.

Scott Carrier, spokesman for the Los Angeles County coroner’s office, said neither body had been examined and the cause of death had not been determined.

“Both of these cases are in an advanced state of decomposition,” he added. Autopsies will be conducted.

A strong odor wafted through the working-class neighborhood Monday. Remnants of yellow police tape rippled in the morning breeze at the entrance to the alley behind the house. Wooden covers to the crawl space under the house were missing on three sides of the structure.

A neighbor, who asked not to be identified, said the discovery of the bodies was “scary.”

Authorities investigating auto thefts in Orange County helped LAPD detectives on the case after a witness found by the Orange County officials reportedly heard Lara talking about the murders.

Police said Lara may have been involved in the theft and transportation of stolen vehicles from Los Angeles to Central America.