A man who was found dead in the yard of a vacant home in Hayward last week has been identified as 29-year-old Marcus Brown of Hawaii, police said Thursday.
Hayward police said a woman reported finding Brown's body face down in the 1400 block of B Street around 2:15 a.m. on Sept. 5.
An autopsy conducted by the Alameda County coroner's office last Friday revealed that Brown had been dead for less than 24 hours when he was discovered but his cause of death hasn't yet been determined, police said.
Sgt. Mark Ormsby said police are treating Brown's death as a possible homicide but won't officially rule it a homicide until his cause of death is known.
Ormsby said police initially thought Brown may have been a transient because he was found in an area that's known for a transient encampment but they no longer think that's the case.
He said a friend from Hawaii contacted San Jose police on Monday to report that Brown, who lived on the island of Kauai, was missing.
Ormsby said Brown had just come to California on Sept. 4, the day before he was found dead.
