Silver Lake Trader Joe's Mural Still Unrestored After a Year

The wall near the registers at the Silver Lake Trader Joe's now reads "Thank You Very Much" on one side and "We Like You Too" on the other. Those are the generic store signs that replaced the mural of Melyda Corado, the 27-year-old assistant manager who was shot and killed there by an LAPD bullet on July 21, 2018. Nearly a year after the store quietly covered the tribute during a remodel, it has not come back. A store manager verbally promised it would. Trader Joe's corporate has not.

Albert Corado Jr. learned his sister's memorial was gone around June 27, 2025, and posted to X (@digitalurn): "apparently the management at the Silverlake Trader Joe's decided to cover up the mural they made for my sister Mely who was shot and killed there by the LAPD back in 2018...What a disrespectful thing to do. I'm pretty pissed about this." He later said the removal "broke his heart." He has spent seven years fighting for accountability for Mely, whom he described as his best friend.

The mural, which Albert Corado Sr. and Albert Corado Jr. dedicated in the years following her death, depicted Mely surrounded by sunflowers, with the Hyperion Bridge and a tie-dye billboard reading "Silver Lake Always" in the background. According to firsthand accounts, her image disappeared piece by piece behind cheap wooden paneling during the remodel. What replaced it carries no name, no face, no memory.

The removal triggered a swift public backlash, including the viral phrase "More Like Traitor Joes." Community advocates pressed the store, and a manager reportedly acknowledged the error and promised restoration after the remodel concluded. No timeline was given. No one at the corporate level has said anything on record.

The grief the mural represented is not abstract. On July 21, 2018, Officers Sinlen Tse and Sarah Winans were pursuing 28-year-old Gene Evin Atkins, who had shot his 78-year-old grandmother, Mary Elizabeth Madison, seven times before leading police on a 15-minute, nine-mile chase. Atkins crashed near the Hyperion Avenue store and ran inside. Tse and Winans fired eight shots toward the entrance. One bullet struck Corado, who had run toward the door to help others. Atkins barricaded himself inside with employees and patrons for roughly three hours before surrendering. He was subsequently charged with 51 felony counts, including Corado's murder. In December 2020, neither officer was charged with a crime. Neither was fired by the LAPD.

The Corado family rejected the city's initial $500,000 settlement offer and kept litigating. On August 30, 2024, attorneys John Taylor and Neil Gehlawat of Taylor & Ring and Ron Rosengarten of Rosengarten and Associates secured a $9.5 million settlement from the City of Los Angeles, described as the largest pre-trial payout the city had ever made in a case involving an LAPD officer-involved shooting. It was ratified as part of nearly $40 million in LAPD-related judgments the Los Angeles City Council approved that same day.

Every July since 2018, crowds have filled the store's parking lot and spilled onto Hyperion Avenue to march for Mely. The store that built her memorial is now the only party that can restore it. The question no one at Trader Joe's corporate has answered is simple: who decided to take it down, and when does it go back up.