CORPSES' ODOR LED TO DISCOVERY IN BURBANK TRUNK.

Byline: Eric Wahlgren Daily News Staff Writer

Residents along a quiet Burbank street first sensed something might be amiss when they noticed a garbage-like smell coming from a four-door sedan parked near the end of the cul-de-sac.

After authorities were finally summoned to the scene, they discovered the badly decomposed bodies of two men in the trunk of a blue Honda, launching a double homicide investigation.

Sheriff's deputies on Friday were trying to locate the two dead men's families and make headway in the case after the Los Angeles County Coroner's Office identified the bodies using fingerprints.

``The investigators are just running all the leads they can as soon as they can because the leads cool, so to speak,'' said Sgt. Susan Cross, a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department. ``Any leads they have they want to be on them right now.''

Cross said late Friday the men's names were not released to the public pending the notification of next of kin.

Burbank police officers first drove out to inspect the car on Thursday at about 5:30 p.m. after receiving reports from several residents about a foul odor emanating from the vehicle parked in the 200 block of West Linden Avenue, said Sgt. Lenny Duran, a police spokesman.

Upon opening the trunk, officers saw the body of a man and immediately summoned coroners, who had the car towed to the medical examiner's office, where they could inspect the corpse without damaging any evidence.

Duran said it was at the coroner's office that investigators determined there were two bodies instead of just one.

Autopsies will be performed over the weekend to determine the cause and time of death and other relevant facts, said Scott Carrier, a coroner's office spokesman.

Duran said Burbank police turned the case over to the Sheriff's Department because officers had reason to believe the killings occurred in the county area outside of Burbank, which so far this year has not logged a single homicide.

Duran did not specify what led officer to conclude that the crime happened somewhere else.

Sandra Najarro, who lives in the 200 block of West Linden Avenue where the car was parked, said this was the first time she had ever heard of a violent crime touching her neighborhood.

Najarro, a 21-year-old page at the Burbank Library, said she had walked past the auto before the police came on Thursday and had noticed flies swarming around it.

``It smelled like garbage,'' Najarro said. ``I thought for a moment that there was garbage because the next day was garbage pick-up day.''

Neighbors could not recall exactly when the mysterious blue car appeared but believed it showed up sometime after Monday, when the street sweeper made its rounds.