Overview
- First responders arrived around 9:30 p.m. on Dec. 3 to a home on the 400 block of West 84th Street in Vermont Knolls, where a 17-year-old with critical injuries was taken to a hospital and pronounced dead.
- A box labeled Cash Game 357, a 357‑shot aerial firework known as a cake or repeater and illegal in California, was recovered at the property, though its role in the blast remains unconfirmed.
- The LAPD Bomb Squad conducted a controlled detonation around 6 a.m. Thursday after detecting additional explosive materials at the site.
- Police say a large quantity of illegal pyrotechnic devices was seized and moved to a secure storage location, and they report no continuing threat to the neighborhood.
- Authorities have not determined whether the lethal device was a standard aerial unit, a modified version, or fully homemade, and the victim’s identity has not been released under the ongoing investigation.