(L.A.) Mia Gonzalez, 4, Died in a Hospital

Case Number: 2024-01664

Los Angeles County is reporting the death of a 4-year-old Hispanic female that occurred in a hospital.

The coroner’s office has identified the child as Mia Gonzalez.

Manner of Death: Homicide

Cause of Death: Combined Effects of Strangulation and Sharp Force Injury of the Wrist

RIP MIA GONZALEZ (November 30, 2019 – January 25, 2024)

Formal pronouncement of death was made on Thursday at 11:33 p.m.

Sheriff’s deputies responded to the 4800 block of Civic Center Way in East Los Angeles after they received a call of a child assault. There, a toddler was found unresponsive in a vehicle.

The girl was taken to a nearby hospital, where she was pronounced dead.

A woman named Maria Del Refugio Avalos (38), later determined to be the child’s mother, was arrested at the scene and is facing a murder charge.

Relatives of Avalos and the young girl told ABC7 that according to investigators, Avalos may have been driving around with the dead child for several days before she was found. They told the station Avalos left with her daughter in the car early last week.

“We were trying to contact her,” the girl’s godmother Noemi Lopez told ABC7. “She wasn’t responding for two days. She said she needed space, that she was going through a lot. … She should’ve asked for help. She should’ve called me.”