(L.A.) Gael Herrera Medina, 1, Died in a Hospital

Case Number: 2021-06060

Los Angeles County is reporting the death of a 1-year-old Hispanic male that occurred in a hospital.

The coroner’s office has identified the child as Gael Herrera Medina.

Manner of Death: Homicide

Cause of Death: Traumatic Head Injury

RIP GAEL HERRERA MEDINA (February 5, 2020 – May 12, 2021)

Formal pronouncement of death was made on Wednesday at 9:37 p.m.

The decedent was 15 months old when he died after being assaulted by his father Jose Juan Herrera.

As of March 2024, Herrera is charged with one count each of murder and assault on a child causing death.

The boy’s mother, Noemi Medina, 33, pleaded no contest in November 2023 to a felony child abuse charge and was sentenced to four years in state prison.

Herrera admitted during a May 2021 interview that he had been left alone with the boy in the apartment in the 4600 block of Valley Boulevard for a period of time and that he had been living with the boy’s mom since February 2021. One of the boy’s half-sisters told an investigator that Herrera was “mean” and described incidents in which he had thrown items at the boy’s head.