Killing of Juliana Redding

Juliana Redding was 21 when she was strangled to death in her Santa Monica, California, home on March 15, 2008. Her mother, unable to reach her, contacted police, who went to Redding's apartment in the 1500 block of Centinela Avenue on March 16. The Santa Monica Police Department's 2008 annual report says officers found her dead and quickly concluded that she had been assaulted. A later federal appellate opinion identifies strangulation as the cause of death and confirms that the apartment was the crime scene.

Santa Monica police continued investigating after the initial inquiry produced no immediate arrest. Detective Karen Thompson led the case. According to the Ninth Circuit's later account, investigators eventually matched DNA recovered from Redding's body to Kelly Soo Park. Los Angeles County prosecutors charged Park with murder in 2010. At her 2013 trial, prosecutors argued that Park's DNA on Redding's neck and elsewhere in the apartment connected her to a violent struggle and that the killing followed the collapse of a business negotiation involving Redding's father.

Park denied killing Redding. Her defense challenged the prosecution's interpretation of the DNA, arguing that it could have reached Redding's possessions through secondary transfer. Counsel also argued that prosecutors had not established a clear motive. The jury deliberated for more than a week. On June 4, 2013, it first acquitted Park of first-degree murder and then, after further argument and deliberation, acquitted her of the lesser second-degree murder charge. The Ninth Circuit subsequently summarized the result as an acquittal on all charges.

The acquittal is a final legal determination as to Park and must not be treated as evidence that she committed the crime. Because the homicide itself is established but no one has been held criminally responsible, the case is classified as unsolved. The coordinates below identify Santa Monica generally and do not pinpoint Redding's private residence.