SAN DIEGO — On December 6, 2023, Allied Gardens Tow Company employees noticed a pungent smell emanating from a wrecked car that had been totaled a month earlier.
Workers then discovered the heavily decomposed body of 65-year-old Monica Cameroni De Adams.
She was found partially buried under her personal belongings in the middle seat of her 2001 Honda Odyssey minivan.
In a tort claim filed with the city of San Diego — considered a precursor to a lawsuit — Cameroni De Adams’ family says San Diego Police Officers failed to check the van for occupants after a drunk driver hit her parked vehicle on Nov. 5, 2023, on Clairemont Mesa Boulevard.
Cameroni De Adams, who was experiencing homelessness at the time, was sleeping inside her van.
But instead of getting medical treatment, the legal claim alleges Cameroni De Adams was left inside, badly injured. She and her van were towed to the Allied Gardens Tow Company, where she later died.
According to the San Diego County Medical Examiner, Cameroni De Adams died from the injuries she suffered in the crash, leaving her family to suspect she was trapped inside of her van in the tow yard, left for dead.
The crash
When San Diego Police officers arrived at the scene in the early morning hours of Nov. 5, 2023, they found a man in a white Hyundai who had rear-ended two cars.
When Officer Matthew Brace started talking to the driver of a white Hyundai Sonata that had rear-ended two parked vehicles. The man, later identified as Jordan Lopez, began to stumble and slur his words as he spoke with police.
According to the collision investigation included in the tort claim obtained by CBS 8, Lopez told Officer Brace he had four beers at a local bar and “had made an oopsie. “
Lopez was arrested — as Cameroni De Adams lay injured in one of the vehicles he’d hit minutes prior.
In his collision investigation, Officer Brace said that officers on the scene tried to contact the registered owners of the vehicles hit but didn’t succeed. Then, the two cars, with Cameroni De Adams inside, were towed away.
“Those two parked vehicles were removed via private tow trucks, from the street as they were filled with property, and I wanted to avoid further vandalism or thefts from inside,” Officer Brace’s report reads.
The family’s legal claim alleges that neither Officer Brace nor anyone else ever checked the vehicles to see if anyone was inside.
The aftermath
Meanwhile, Cameroni De Adams’ family grew concerned as the days passed.
When Cameroni De Adams didn’t respond to birthday messages the family sent her on November 13, 2023, De Adams’ daughter, Natalia Danielle Cameroni-Adams filed a missing persons report with San Diego Police.
Finally, on December 6, 2023, more than one month after De Adams and her car were towed to the Allied Gardens Tow Compain lot, a worker in search of the pungent smell discovered Cameroni De Adams’ decomposed body.
Cameroni De Adams’ skeleton, said the Medical Examiner’s Report, was visible.
“The face was unrecognizable due to the condition of her body,” wrote the Medical Examiner.
According to the autopsy, Cameroni De Adams had “multiple and extensive” rib fractures, a spinal fracture, and a compound fracture in her right upper arm.
Yet, Cameroni De Adams’ daughter and son were still left without answers despite the discovery.
The Medical Examiner ruled the cause of her death to be blunt force trauma and ruled the death an accident.
According to the legal claim, Natalia Cameroni-Adams and her brother did not even see the Medical Examiner’s report until Oct. 16, 2024, nearly a year after their mother’s death.
Driver Jordan Lopez has since agreed to a plea deal in the crash, according to court documents obtained by CBS 8, and faces six years in prison and five years of probation. Lopez’s attorney argued in court that Cameroni De Adams was likely alive after the crash and died afterward, bypassing charges of vehicular manslaughter.
Lopez’s sentencing is scheduled for March 20.
CBS 8 contacted San Diego Police about the allegations, but the City Attorney’s office replied and said they are unable to comment on this case.