A 71-year-old Dinuba man died at his home in August of natural causes, and more than two months later, investigators still haven't identified any relatives to notify. The Tulare County Sheriff's Office is now asking the public for help tracking down next of kin for Eduardo Ortiz-Medrano.
Ortiz-Medrano was found dead at his Dinuba home on August 14, according to KMPH, which reports that his cause of death was natural causes. Anyone with information about the case is asked to call the Tulare County Sheriff's Coroner's Office at (559) 687-7000.
A Pattern of Unclaimed Deaths in the Valley
Ortiz-Medrano's case isn't an isolated one for Tulare County investigators. In a separate Dinuba case, 64-year-old Nicholas Ortiz Sembrano was found dead in his home on September 3 after neighbors asked deputies to perform a welfare check, also from natural causes, according to YourCentralValley.com. Relatives of Sembrano were asked to contact Detective Tomas Lopez at the same (559) 687-7000 line now listed for Ortiz-Medrano's case.
Just a few months earlier, the county's coroner's office made a similar appeal for 35-year-old Magdaleno Hernandez-Enriquez, who was found dead in Tulare on June 15, according to The Fresno Bee. Authorities believed Hernandez-Enriquez lived in the Goshen area and may have had ties to both Tulare and Los Angeles, and the paper listed a separate detective's line for that case.
Why the Office Waits Before Releasing Details
These appeals reflect a standing policy at the sheriff's office rather than an unusual gap in any single investigation. Per the Tulare County Sheriff's Office, the agency releases information about deceased individuals only after next of kin has been notified — a practice that explains why cases like Ortiz-Medrano's can linger publicly for weeks before family members are located, or why some are never resolved in public reporting at all.
For now, Ortiz-Medrano's family remains unidentified, and the sheriff's office has not said whether any leads have come in since the case became public. Anyone who may have information is urged to call the coroner's office directly.
