Unidentified

An unidentified Latino male, thought to be between 25 and 35 years old, was found lying near the entrance to a Valley Center campground Saturday night with a gunshot wound to his head, sheriff's deputies said. Homicide detectives for the San Diego County Sheriff's Department called the shooting an attempted murder, but say they have no suspects and know of no motive. The man was found lying near the entrance to Lilac Oaks Campground on Lilac Road shortly after 5:30 p.m. A couple driving by the campground discovered the body and drove the man to the California Department of Forestry station in Valley Center.

TUCSON - The harsh Sonoran Desert claims the lives of hundreds of people crossing the U.S.-Mexico border each year. Many of the dead - about 1 in 3 - go unidentified. Now there may be an easier way to put a name to some of the suspected border crossers who died north of the international boundary. On Monday, the Pima County Office of the Medical Examiner and the human rights organization Humane Borders Inc. started an online system that will allow the public to identify the deceased found in southern Arizona - more than 2,000 deaths over 13 years.

Four days a week, Todd Matthews earns $11.50 an hour working for an automotive parts supplier. After work he drives half a mile to his little beige house on a hill, where he spends the next seven hours immersed in a very different world. The faces seem to float from his computer -- morgue photographs, artist sketches, forensic reconstructions -- thousands of dead eyes staring from websites as though crying out for recognition. "John" and "Jane" and "Baby Does" whose bodies have never been identified.

A man was critically wounded Saturday in a shooting on the 110 Freeway in downtown Los Angeles that halted southbound traffic for more than two hours. The shooting occurred about 5 p.m. between 8th and 9th streets, said Los Angeles Fire Department spokesman Cecil Manresa. The unidentified victim was shot twice and may have been thrown from a car, authorities said. Los Angeles police were searching for the shooter, who fled in a burgundy or gray Camry with its rear window blown out. Although officials had indicated that southbound lanes might be closed for up to eight hours while investigators searched for clues, two lanes closest to the center divider were reopened by about 7:15 p.m. Caltrans freeway cameras showed that traffic, backed up more than a mile, was loosening up and vehicles were again traveling southbound by 8 p.m. Authorities were investigating whether the shooting might have been gang-related and whether multiple suspects were involved, said Los Angeles police Sgt. John Kirkpatrick.

There is a high potential for abuse when hospitals harvest human organs from unidentified patients, as described in the article "Unidentified Man's Heart Used in Transplant" (Aug. 29). Before we begin seeing bird-doggers and bounty hunters out there looking for such "donors," the laws governing this procedure need to be strengthened. For example, what is the specific definition of diligent search ? Granted we have high-tech communications these days, but with the mobility of our society it is possible for people to simply disappear for some time without other family members knowing, or even being concerned, about their whereabouts.

A paraglider was killed Friday afternoon in a crash-landing on a hillside trail near Corral Canyon, authorities said. The unidentified victim died at the scene of the accident. The incident was reported at 3:40 p.m., according to the Los Angeles County Fire Department.

The decomposing body of a man in his 40s was discovered Wednesday in the bedroom of a Santa Ana home by an occupant of the house who called police, officers said. Santa Ana Police Sgt. Jim McDaniel said the body of the unidentified man showed signs of "trauma" that indicated a homicide. But he said investigators were still trying to determine the cause of death.

Police have arrested two suspects in the fatal shooting Friday night of a teen-ager at Martin Luther King Park in Southeast San Diego. Police Sgt. Nate Caplan said Sunday that Robert Lazaga, 19, of the 6500 block of Broadrick Place and an unidentified juvenile were booked on suspicion of murder. The victim, John Castro, who was shot in the head and shoulder, died after being taken to Mercy Hospital by a Life Flight helicopter.

Police are investigating the death of a woman found burned in a parking lot early Saturday. The unidentified victim was discovered about 8:30 a.m. in the 1800 block of Kettering Street after being reported by a passer-by. Irvine police believe the victim was in her mid-20s and was burned in the parking lot. An autopsy was pending. -- Jason Song

If the Stones don't tour, the world will stop revolving. There are just some things our society can't do without, and one is Mick Jagger's bulge prancing about in front of three virtually unidentified Joes. I wouldn't go see them anyway. I think their best years were the years when my top 10s consisted of lullabies. SIVI PEDERSON Long Beach

- The first witness in Jerry Sandusky's trial testified Monday that the former Penn State University assistant football coach sexually abused him as a young teenager on campus and in hotels and later sent him "creepy love letters. " Identified in court papers as Victim 4, the witness said "soap battles" in the shower escalated into inappropriate touching and oral sex. Under cross-examination, he said he felt responsible for what happened to other boys because he didn't come forward earlier.

A day after human remains were found in a West Texas pasture, investigators had yet to identify them, but people couldn't help wondering whether they belonged to a missing cheerleader. Hailey Dunn, 13, disappeared more than a year ago from her Colorado City home about 100 miles southeast of Lubbock. It was still unclear late Wednesday whether the remains found Tuesday near a city-owned airport in Big Spring, about 40 miles west of Colorado City, could be Hailey's. The mother of a person of interest in the case lives in Big Spring.  At a Wednesday news conference broadcast from an airport hangar by KOSA , Big Spring Police Sgt. Tony Everett described the remains as "partially mummified and skeletal," saying it was impossible to speculate about the person's identity or sex. “An anthropologist is going to have to make that determination,” he said.

Ryan Bonaminio walked into Ramona High School as a shy, greenhorn freshman and left as a Marine Corps ROTC platoon leader, charging head-on into the U.S. Army and two tours in Iraq before returning to his hometown and his dream job. But his career as a Riverside police officer was cut short. Bonaminio, who would have celebrated his 28th birthday Thanksgiving Day, was shot and killed Sunday night next to a dark roadside by an unidentified suspect who remains at large. "He was a good kid. It's a big loss to this community, especially when you're talking about someone who went into harm's way in a combat zone, then came home to protect your city and gets killed in his own backyard," said Sgt. Maj. Henry David Jr., his ROTC instructor.

Officials at the San Fernando Valley clinic where a porn performer tested HIV-positive last month announced Friday that two rounds of tests showed no other adult film actors had contracted the virus. The performer tested HIV-positive Oct. 9 at the Adult Industry Medical Healthcare Foundation, or AIM, in Sherman Oaks. The clinic routinely tests performers working in the Valley's adult film industry for sexually transmitted diseases and maintains a database of their results. Once the new HIV case was detected, clinic officials created a quarantine list to test performers who had worked with the porn actor, referred to in Friday's announcement as "Patient Zeta.

A former teammate of Lance Armstrong has told federal investigators that the seven-time Tour de France winner participated in illegal doping practices when both were members of the U.S. Postal Service cycling team, the New York Times reported Wednesday night. Federal prosecutors are investigating Armstrong's possible involvement in doping. But the former teammate, who the paper did not identify but said had never tested positive for performance-enhancing drugs, has not been called before the grand jury that has been convened in Los Angeles to investigate the case, the report said.

The Los Angeles County coroner's office is seeking the public's help in identifying a woman whose remains were found last year in the Angeles National Forest after the Station fire. Coroner's officials this week released a composite sketch of the Jane Doe, who officials believe was a white or Latina woman between the ages of 20 and 40. The sketch was created using clay reconstruction technology. The woman's skull was found Dec. 26 in a burned-out area below Angeles Forest Highway two days after hikers in the same area discovered a male skull with an apparent bullet hole, officials said.

Anheuser-Busch Cos., the biggest U.S. brewer, may be preparing to reject InBev's $46.3-billion takeover offer and announce plans to lower costs and sell off divisions. The St. Louis maker of Budweiser beer may say soon that the Belgium firm's $65-a-share bid is inadequate, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing unidentified people familiar with the matter. The company may also say it plans to eliminate $1 billion in costs over four years, pay a special dividend and study the possible sale of its theme-park division.

The Navy may reduce the number of warships patrolling the Indian Ocean but it will not withdraw all of its naval forces from the region, the Defense Department said. "There is no change in our commitment in the Indian Ocean. We will continue to have a presence in the region," the Pentagon said, responding to a story by the Hearst News Service, which quoted an unidentified Administration source as saying the United States has decided to withdraw its naval forces from the Indian Ocean.

The California attorney general's office said Wednesday that it has arrested a suspect in an alleged prescription drug ring that Atty. Gen. Jerry Brown said provided illegal drugs to actor Corey Haim. Haim was found unresponsive last week at his mother's apartment. He later died at a hospital in what Los Angeles Police Department officials said appeared to be an accidental overdose. Brown announced Friday that his office was investigating a "massive" drug ring that provided prescriptions for Haim.

Halfway up an embankment, below the junction of the 210 and 118 freeways, lay the charcoal remains of a man's life: charred newspapers and encyclopedias, a seared carpet, food cans popped open by intense heat. It was more than a year ago that gusty winds drove a wildfire from the canyons above Sylmar and down to the freeway connector, where it destroyed a small encampment. After the flames subsided, firefighters discovered the burned bodies of a man and a dog. The man's body was taken to the Los Angeles County morgue.