84-Year-Old Beating Victim Dies After Attack in Glendale Apartment

Family members arrived at the location in the 1800 block of Glenoaks Boulevard Monday morning

An 84-year-old man died Monday morning after he was attacked in a Glendale apartment complex.

The beating was reported about 5:30 a.m. in the 1800 block of Glenoaks Boulevard (map), where the victim lived in a first-floor corner apartment. Authorities are attempting to determine whether the beating occurred during a robbery. 

The victim was identified late Monday as Ruben Sanchez. The slaying is the first in Glendale this year, according to police.

A neighboring family heard loud noises coming from Sanchez’s apartment early Monday. The family members checked on their neighbor and found what police described as a "badly beaten and bloodied" victim.

"It's a little heinous to think that someone would do such a thing to an elder," Glendale Police Sgt. Tom Lorenz said.

A friend of the victim, Jose Valle said he knew Sanchez for decades, since Sanchez emigrated from Cuba in the 1970s. NBC4 spoke to him as he was coming by to deliver lunch to his friend.

"When I saw the police, I asked them and they told me what happened," said Valle, a friend and former co-worker of Sanchez.

Valle's concern, he said , is that whoever did this may have known the victim.

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“Somebody tried to rob him a few weeks ago,” Valle said. “He got bruised all over his legs and knees.”

Detectives said a motive remained unclear late Monday, but said there was no sign of forced entry, no sign of a struggle, and only slight evidence of a robbery.

"It looked as if someone was searching for something. Not so much ransacked where everything was thrown around, but it does look like someone was moving things around," Lorenz said.

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