Police were trying yesterday to identify a woman whose severely beaten body was found on an East Baltimore street -- one of two homicide victims found in the city within a seven-hour period.

The woman's body was discovered about 12:15 a.m. Wednesday behind a building in the 1700 block of Rutland Ave., said Officer Nicole Monroe, a police spokeswoman.

Monroe said the woman's body bore numerous injuries and that the results of an autopsy by the state medical examiner's office were pending.

"The injuries were such that we're working the woman's death as a homicide," Monroe said.

Seven hours later in the Brooklyn section of South Baltimore, the body of 20-year-old Xavier William Campbell, whose address was not available, was found lying in front of a house in the 800 block of Clintwood Court near Sixth Street. He died from several gunshot wounds to the body, Monroe said.

Their deaths raise the city's homicide toll as of yesterday to 239, compared with 237 at the same time last year, police said.