A 65-year-old man was found dead on a sidewalk near an entrance to Disneyland in Anaheim on Sunday afternoon, according to police. Officers located the man unconscious near the park's south entrance off Katella Avenue, and he was later pronounced dead at the scene.
Anaheim police Sgt. Eric Anderson said the man was transient and known to the agency, as reported by the Los Angeles Times. Anderson said the man appeared to have died of natural causes. Officers waited for coroner's officials to arrive while the area was briefly closed, the paper's report noted.
No Signs of Foul Play, Police Say
The newspaper's account did not indicate any suspicion of criminal involvement in the man's death, and the only cause assessment on record is Anderson's initial read that it appeared natural. Investigators have not released the man's identity, and the circumstances of exactly when he was discovered were not detailed beyond the officers' response and the brief closure of the sidewalk while they awaited the coroner.
The death adds to a string of fatalities that have occurred at or near the Anaheim theme park's perimeter in recent years. In December 2024, Anaheim police investigated a shooting death a few blocks from Disneyland, after officers found a man sitting in a vehicle with at least one gunshot wound near South Margie Lane and Wakefield Avenue, according to CBS Los Angeles. That victim was identified as 25-year-old Anaheim resident Kenneth Wayne Swets.
Earlier Death at a Disneyland Parking Structure
In a separate incident, Anaheim police said a man in his 50s jumped to his death from a parking structure at Disneyland on a Saturday night, with the incident reported at about 9 p.m. and both police and the Orange County coroner's office responding, per ABC7. Guest accounts cited by the station said Disneyland trams were shut down at the time and some visitors had to walk back to their vehicles.
Homelessness Counts and Deaths Across Orange County
The man's death comes against a backdrop of persistent homelessness across Orange County, where the 2026 Point-in-Time Count tallied 6,321 people experiencing homelessness, including 3,256 people in emergency shelters or transitional housing and 3,065 who were unsheltered, according to the County of Orange. The county reported an overall 13.7% decrease in homelessness compared with 2024, though separate figures from the same county announcement describe a larger drop — cited as 27% — specifically in the unsheltered population; a third, lower-confidence summary of that same count put the unsheltered decline at 26.6%. The unsheltered portion of the count was conducted over three days, from January 27 through January 29, 2026, with help from more than 1,300 volunteers, the county said.
Deaths among people experiencing homelessness in Orange County have climbed in recent years. A county Sheriff-Coroner homeless death review summary found 395 deaths in 2021, 496 in 2022 and 508 in 2023 — an increase described as 50% from 2020 to 2023, though that figure carries lower confidence in the underlying data. A separate, low-confidence summary tied to the 2024 death review also noted a 6% overrepresentation of male deaths compared with 2024 Point-in-Time data showing 72% of the county's unsheltered population identified as male.
