The body of a 37-year-old Reseda man was found burning in a work van on Tuesday morning close to a hiking trail near Mulholland Drive.
Joel Ravin’s death is being investigated as a homicide, according to the Los Angeles Police Department.
Firefighters responded around 8:40 a.m. to the scene where they discovered the charred human remains.
Ravin, who is the registered owner of the van, was soon identified as the man found “between the front seats, badly burned,” the LAPD said. The van was found on Rosario Road, just south of Mulholland.
Witnesses described a black sedan leaving the scene at the time the van caught fire. No arrests have been made in relation to the discovery, police said.
The incident marks the second suspicious death within a week in which a man’s body has been found in a vehicle after it had become engulfed in flames. On Thursday, a body was found in a burning pickup truck on Carbon Canyon Road in Brea.
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