(L.A.) Eric Valencia, 37, Died in Azusa Due to PD Neglect

Case Number: 2026-05070

Los Angeles County is reporting the death of a 37-year-old Latino male that occurred in Azusa.

The coroner’s office identified the man as Eric Valencia.

Height: 6 feet 1 inch / Weight: 145 pounds

Manner of Death: Accident

Cause of Death: Hyperthermia

RIP ERIC VALENCIA (March 16, 1989 – March 26, 2026)

Formal pronouncement of death was made on Thursday at 4:59 a.m.

Ruling by the deputy medical examiner was published in late May, presumably after the results of tox screening had come back from the lab. The pathologist was Dr. Ansel Nam.

The decedent had been found lifeless inside a patrol vehicle parked in front of the Azusa Police Department headquarters at 725 North Alameda Avenue.

He was arrested the previous Friday on suspicion of DUI and child endangerment and was released from custody on Monday, March 23.

According to investigators, he entered the back seat of the unlocked patrol car shortly after his release and remained there for about four days before being discovered.

A civilian employee found him. The vehicle was inactive and awaiting maintenance.

Note that the decedent lived just a mile away from the police station. That is a walkable distance even in the heat. He had family who had reported him missing, meaning people who would have come to get him immediately with a single phone call. He was ambulatory, purposeful, and with a charged cellphone. A man in that situation — with a family a mile away — can be expected to go home as quickly as possible and essentially has no rational reason to get into the back of a police SUV on his own initiative.

Description from YouTube Video:

Man found dead in Azusa PD SUV didn’t call 911 despite working phone

This looks to have been alcohol withdrawal syndrome.

“Clouded sensorium” or mild delirium is a state where someone can walk, respond to simple questions, and seem lucid in brief interactions, yet remain profoundly disoriented regarding context, consequences, and situational awareness.

While severe delirium tremens (DTs) is marked by overt agitation and vivid hallucinations, milder or subclinical withdrawal may manifest as quiet confusion, in which the individual appears cooperative but has a significantly impaired ability to accurately perceive and interpret their surroundings.

Severe alcohol withdrawal floods the body with stress hormones and causes uncontrolled muscle activity, which dramatically raises core temperature. That internal heat, combined with the trapped heat inside a locked vehicle, can lead to fatal hyperthermia.

Although the ultimate physiological cause of death may be attributed to alcohol withdrawal complications, the Azusa Police Department bears significant culpability through systemic neglect that directly precipitated the fatality.

By releasing a detainee after 62 hours in custody without apparent medical evaluation—despite the high probability that he was entering the dangerous phase of delirium tremens—authorities turned a vulnerable, disoriented, and physiologically compromised individual back onto the street without a safety net.

This failure of care was compounded by a sequence of security lapses: leaving a vehicle unlocked in a secure lot, failing to conduct standard inventory checks on a vehicle sitting idle for nearly four days, and failing to search the immediate perimeter of the station even after being informed that a recently released inmate was missing.

While withdrawal created the medical crisis, the institution’s failure to secure the vehicle and monitor its own property created the sealed environment that transformed a treatable condition into a death sentence.