UPDATE, MARCH 27, 8:52 A.M.: Un Young Lee, 42, of San Dimas, is due in court in Los Angeles Pomona today after being booked for the murder of her mother-in-law, whose Diamond Bar home caught fire early Wednesday.
The body of the victim was found in an SUV stopped in Tustin around 7 a.m. Wednesday, according to the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department.
The Orange County coroner says 77-year-old Young Ja Lee died at her home.
Un Young Lee, who is being held in lieu of $1 million bail, was arrested on suspicion of murder, deputies say.
Her arraignment has been set for April 24.
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ORIGINAL POST, MARCH 26, 6:31 A.M.: Officers detained a driver around 8 a.m. Wednesday near Tustin Ranch Road and Greenway Drive after figuring out she was somehow connected to a residential fire and woman's suspected death in Diamond Bar hours earlier.
Neither the driver nor the presumed victim have been identified.
Fire crews responded around 1:30 a.m. Wednesday to a fire at a home in the 1200 block of North Diamond Bar Boulevard, according to the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, which adds a search of the residence did not turn up a body but did lead to arson investigators being called out.
Then came what police and sheriff's officials called the “suspicious vehicle” stop in Tustin about 6 1/2 hours later. These officials say the driver lived at the Diamond Bar home as did her mother-in-law, and homicide investigators feared Ma's remains might be inside the vehicle.
But as of Wednesday afternoon, all that had been released to the media was that several bags and household items were in the vehicle that was headed to the Orange County coroner's office for closer inspection.
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OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.