Jerry and Ruth Livingston recovered from their wounds. Their son continued seeing doctors for his emotional problems. The family never spoke publicly about the incident again, but on a website dedicated to Jerry Livingston’s music, the couple’s other son posted a photo of a smiling family with a caption that says Gary passed away. The picture was taken in 1980 on the night Jerry Livingston was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame.
Police say Gary Livingstong “went beserk” because his parents were “bugging” him.
1966
Tycoon Kidnap Plot Backfires • Informant Killed
If this story were a movie, the closing scene would be the dramatic last moments of a police informant dying in an officer’s arms, and it would have played out like this:
The informant lay on the mansion’s marble floor, gasping for his last few breaths. “What went wrong?” he implored, clutching the arm of the police officer kneeling next to him.
The detective put down his smoking gun then reached out to comfort the soon-to-be dead informant. “Why didn’t you hit the deck?” he asked softly.
George Skalla hesitated, gathered up every last little bit of life left in him, and managed a few final words. “I…I…I froze,” he sputtered. And with that, Skalla—a twenty-five-year-old, former first-string football tackle, turned small-time criminal, turned police informant—was dead. So was his partner-in-crime, forty-four-year-old ex-convict Calvin Bailey. Bailey’s lifeless body was just a few feet away from Skalla’s, a grotesque plastic Halloween mask still on his face, blood seeping out of bullet holes in his chest. Four police officers stood over him. Such a shame, this was not at all what they had planned. No one was supposed to get killed.
The whole saga started when Skalla recruited Bailey to help him with his latest plan to kidnap a rich guy. The two daredevils decided to kidnap multimillionaire Leonard Firestone, of the wealthy tire-manufacturing family. Bailey was in his glory planning the big payday, he kept nattering on about how the ransom demand should be two million—then four—no, he decided, maybe they should go for eight million? Skalla was scared by Bailey’s intensity and began wondering if this greedy bastard might kill him once they got the payoff.
Skalla had a “Come to Jesus” moment—he told his mother he was tired of being on the wrong side of the law. He turned himself in to the police, not only telling them about the kidnapping plans, but also confessing to more than fifty unsolved robberies in Beverly Hills and Los Angeles. Detectives were elated, and they gladly recruited Skalla as an undercover operative, asking him to help snare Bailey. They carefully planned a sting operation. On the night of the kidnapping, January 13,1966, Skalla was to bring Bailey to the mansion, and once the maid (an undercover policewoman) let them in, Skalla would hit the deck, and officers would step in and apprehend only Bailey.
Skalla was given a special undercover car: a 1965 black sedan equipped with a tape recorder in the trunk and a microphone hidden in the dash. He could press a tiny button and record everything his partner said during the crime.
A few days before the event, police moved the Firestone family out of their mansion on North Alpine Drive. On the day of the kidnapping, four officers moved into the house. Skalla secretly placed a call; he and Bailey were about to leave his house to go to Beverly Hills.
The sun had just set. Skalla and Bailey got into the sedan. Bailey threw a mask, gloves, rope, tape, knives, and guns in the backseat. A few miles before they reached their destination, Bailey got out of the car and entered a phone booth to call the Firestone house, just to be sure the millionaire was there. Skalla pressed the little button on the dash and whispered into the microphone, “He’s making a phone call to Firestone now.”
Bailey got back into the car and told Skalla, “Firestone’s there. I just talked to the maid; she told me he’s working on the garbage disposal. Guess he’s throwing Coke bottles down there.”
Bailey had misunderstood. What the maid/undercover cop actually said was, “Mr. Firestone is indisposed,” not “Mr. Firestone is in the disposal.”
The two criminals drove up to the mansion, stopping at the far end of the drive, lights and engine off. Bailey pulled on the full-face mask, and Skalla put on just a hat, heart pounding now. He’d be the one doing the talking. The duo grabbed their guns and stepped up to the front door, Bailey off to the side, and Skalla in front of the peephole. “Parcel Post delivery, ma’am.” The door opened, and, suddenly, the carefully orchestrated plan went haywire.
“They moved in fast and saw us,” maintained an officer. “Bailey raised his gun and pointed it at us. They were prepared to shoot us. We shot first.”
“Skalla kept coming,” said another detective, “They were bunched right together. He was going to jump aside, which he did not do. He didn’t jump aside, and that was it.”
Neither Bailey nor Skalla ever fired a single bullet. Caught in the cop’s rapid-fire barrage, Bailey was killed instantly, taking direct hits to the chest, heart, and lungs. Skalla was hit by ricocheting bullets and lingered for several minutes until he succumbed from wounds to the neck and gut. A full investigation and hearing into the shooting was launched; the coroner’s jury ruled the officer’s actions as justifiable homicide.
Skalla’s family was now burying their son instead of hailing him as the hero he had hoped to be. His mom wept to reporters, “George said, ‘Mom, I’m officially connected with the police department now. Don’t worry, I’m doing something for society—not against it.’ “
Clark Fogg’s Analysis:
This was such an unfortunate incident and an example of what can happen when the best-laid plans go awry. It’s always tricky when individuals are working with the police department. Detectives can only protect their informant to a certain point; when officers and other individuals are at extreme risk, police have to respond. Informants are not trained police officers. They don’t have the skills and tactics to handle adverse conditions, especially those involving firearms. In this attempted kidnap, the informant froze, then followed the other suspect’s lead. It’s possible the detectives on site thought the informant changed his mind and aligned with the suspect.
A Beverly Hills police officer tends to masked victim Calvin Bailey.
Police inadvertently shot and killed their informant, George Skalla.
George Skalla’s partner-in-crime, Calvin Bailey, was also inadvertently killed.
Industrialist Leonard Firestone’s family left their Alpine Drive home for a week so police could remain on site.
The kidnappers planned to ask for a two-million dollar ransom.
Other High-Profile Kidnappings
1967 Eleven-Year Old Son of CEO Kidnapped
When eleven-year-old Kenneth Young’s parents came home late from a party one night, they took a quick look into their four children’s bedrooms. All was well. Imagine their horror the next morning when Kenneth didn’t come down for breakfast. He had been kidnapped from his first-floor bedroom in the middle of the night, a ransom note pinned to his pillow. “Do not call the police, or your missing merchandise will be vindictively destroyed,” warned the abductor. “We need $250,000.”
The boy’s father, Herbert Young, president of Gibraltar Savings and Loan, notified police and the FBI. Agent Paul Chamberlain successfully negotiated the recovery of the child who was found unharmed, four days later. But it took three years to track down the kidnapper, Ronald Lee Miller, a former IRS agent whom authorities said led a triple life. By day, Miller was a federal agent, working not only for the IRS, but assigned as a bodyguard to politicians, like President Nixon. By night, he was “a swinging ladies’ man.” But his full-time obsession was getting away with crimes: the kidnapping and several robberies.
While Miller may have been slick, he was not lucky. One of his accomplices snitched on him, and three days before a statute of limitations on the kidnapping charge ran out, FBI agents arrested Miller. His bad luck continued when he was released from prison after do
ing thirteen years—he was murdered while jogging around a track in Sacramento, his skull crushed and his ribs broken. His killer was never caught.
Kenneth Young points to a Los Angeles Harald-Examiner headline.
Young’s kidnapper, Ronald Miller, a former makeup artist, was a master of disguise.
1968 Four-Year-Old Son of Banker Kidnapped
What would you do if a kidnapper tied you up and was about to take your baby away? Little Stanley Stalford’s mom deserves a mother-of-the-decade award for what she did when that happened to her. “It’s a game, Honey, a burglar game,” she said as the kidnapper began to stuff her mouth with a gag. “Do what they want you to do.” The abductor wanted a $250,000 ransom from the boy’s father, Stanley Stalford Sr., the wealthy board chairman of Fidelity Bank. The FBI helped Stalford arrange a payoff meeting; the abductor brought the sedated child with him. But at the last minute, sensing a trap, the kidnapper sped off with Stanley, unbuckled, in the front seat. Officers and agents took off in hot pursuit; the twenty-eight-block chase ended in a spectacular gunfight and car crash. The child, slightly injured, cried, “I want my Mommy!” as officers pulled him from the car. The ex-con kidnapper, Robert Dacy, suffered a broken leg and lacerations. He was taken into custody at the crash site, sent to a hospital, and then to prison where he died several years later.
Little Stanley Stalford was back in the safety of his father’s arms after a wild predawn car chase.
Kidnapper Robery Dacy was arraigned while he was in the hospital.
1969 Nineteen-Year-Old Stanford Student Kidnapped
Alan Ramo, son of multimillionaire missile expert and TRW founder Dr. Simon Ramo, stepped outside of his family’s Trousdale Estates mansion on a Monday morning to feed some kittens. The little tabbies would go hungry that day. Alan was kidnapped by a masked gunman, taken to a nearby canyon and handcuffed to a tree. A $250,000 ransom note was left at the house by the front door. Meanwhile, back at the tree, Alan worked his gag loose, called for help, and was rescued by a city employee working nearby. Since the kidnapper had said he would return with food later that night, police set a trap. A detective took Alan’s place at the tree, and when twenty-three-year-old John Jacob Santen showed up with a peanut butter sandwich later that evening, he was promptly arrested. Santen, a merchant seaman, was sent to prison. His mother told reporters, “I cannot explain my son’s activities. I was flabbergasted.”
Twenty-five-year-old kidnapper John Santen was sentenced to life in prison for kidnapping Ramo.
1966
Frank Sinatra Polo Lounge Fight • Millionaire In Coma
Iconic “Mr. Rat Pack” crooner Frank Sinatra was known for many things: his “cool” factor, his love life (especially the affair with the luscious actress Ava Gardner), and his rumored ties to the mob. Then there was the incident where kidnappers abducted his nineteen-year-old son, Frank Jr., from Harrah’s Casino in Lake Tahoe. (Senior paid the abductors $240,000 and got his son back, unharmed. The kidnappers went to prison.)
But for all of this drama, the only time Sinatra was in legal trouble in Beverly Hills was when he stood accused of assaulting the president of Hunt Foods, Frederick R. Weisman. Sinatra claimed he never touched the man. But one fact the singer could not deny: Weisman was in a coma after undergoing cranial surgery, and his wife was receiving calls warning them not to press charges against Sinatra.
So what really happened the night of June 8, 1966? Picture a plush and darkened Polo Lounge at the Beverly Hills Hotel, a late Tuesday night about a half-hour before closing time. In one booth: Sinatra’s entourage—his pal Dean Martin, a few more buddies, and some pretty girls. The drinks were still flowing; the conversation was loud and rowdy. In the next booth: Frederick Weisman was sitting with Franklin Fox. The two fathers were quietly celebrating the engagement of Weisman’s son to Fox’s lovely daughter, a former Miss Teenage Boston. Annoyed by the noise in the booth next to them, Weisman got up to leave.
What happened next, in a matter of just moments, was a blur: a struggle, a crash, fisticuffs. Dean Martin was overheard urging Sinatra “Let’s get out of here! Let’s get out of here!”
When police arrived, they found Weisman semi-conscious, flat on his back amid ashtrays, tablecloths, and broken crystal. He was taken to an emergency-care facility and released. When Weisman failed to wake up the next morning, doctors sent him straight into surgery.
Police interviewed several staff members who all gave similar accounts. They didn’t see exactly what happened, but they did see a short struggle. So did Sinatra hit Weisman? Or did Weisman hit Sinatra then fall accidentally? None of the staff could say for sure, but the chief of security did confirm, “Sinatra had a mouse [bruise] under his right eye.”
Given that Sinatra had a history of fist fighting, it wasn’t a stretch to think he may have busted Weisman in the face. (Just the year before, Sinatra punched out a hotel owner in Pebble Beach during the Bing Crosby golf tournament after he and a friend—Dean Martin again—were told the kitchen was closed. No charges were filed in that case.)
But the bruised singer swore he never laid a hand on Weisman and denied rumors that he or one of his cronies beaned the millionaire with an ashtray or one of the phones that were at every table in the Polo Lounge. “He walked up to me and said ‘You talk too f*#&ing loud and you have a bunch of loud-mouthed friends,’” claimed Sinatra. “I thought he was kidding, then I realized he wasn’t. I told him, ‘Hey Mister, you are out of line.’ Then the man hit me. Another man jumped between us. I at no time saw anyone hit him, and I certainly did not.”
Weisman eventually came out of his coma and recovered. He never filed charges against the singer, saying he wanted to just “forget the whole thing ever happened.”
Clark Fogg’s Analysis:
While it’s impossible to know for sure, after reading the files, I’d have to say I don’t think Sinatra ever touched Weisman, but most likely Sinatra did take the first punch from Weisman. It’s a known fact that Sinatra rarely went anywhere without protection. I think his mob buddies were with him that night, and they wanted to give Weisman “something to remember,” a message not to mess with Frank.
Sinatra was photographed around the time of the Polo Lounge tussle.
Ava Gardner called Frank Sinatra “the love of her life”.
1977
Buried in a Ferrari • An Eccentric Last Wish
She never got the fame she craved in life, but in death, Sandra Ilene West made an everlasting impression. The young Beverly Hills millionaire was buried in a Ferrari, just as she had stipulated in her will, “next to my husband, in my lacy nightgown, and in my Ferrari with the seat slanted comfortably.”
To discourage grave robbers, two truckloads of concrete were poured over the twenty-foot-long container cradling the high-performance vehicle with Sandra’s body inside. Her husband, Ike West, was in the plot next to hers. He had been buried in the San Antonio cemetery nine years earlier. Finally, the couple was reunited. They’d both led a wild, but short, life together as man and wife in Beverly Hills.
Ike was only thirty-three when he died. His body was found in a hotel room at the Flamingo Hilton in Las Vegas. The coroner’s report states he died of natural causes. Family and friends wondered if his early demise had anything to do with his health problems or history of drug use. After all, he and Sandra had been living life in the fast lane, thanks to Ike’s millions. (Ike and his brother had inherited a fortune from their Texas-tycoon father, a cattle rancher and oil investor.)
Sandra was devastated when Ike died, but she carried on with style. The attractive widow, draped in furs and dripping with jewels, could often be seen cruising down Sunset Boulevard in one of her three Ferraris or a 1975 Stutz Blackhawk. Eventually Sandra retreated from the social scene and began staying home more. She had a few accidents in each one of the Ferraris, leaving them all slightly damaged. The last accident left her with serious injuries, and she began taking medication to control the pain
. The night Sandra died, she told a nurse she had a stomachache and went to bed early. Sandra was found dead the next morning. The coroner’s report lists the cause of death as an overdose from barbiturates and pain medication.
When executors read her will, they were shocked by her request, especially the instructions she left behind to make sure her unusual demands would be carried out. If her executor (her husband’s brother) followed through with her wish to be buried in her favorite Ferrari next to her husband, then the brother would get her three-million-dollar estate. If he didn’t do as she asked, he would only get ten thousand dollars. So the slightly dented baby-blue 1964 Ferrari 250 GT was shipped to Texas, where cranes and cement trucks were put into position. The staff carefully lowered the lady in the nightgown, in the car, in the super-sized coffin, into the ground.
One tiny mystery remained: was Sandra really buried in her favorite Ferrari? A woman who claims Sandra was her aunt blogged on a Ferrari fan site that Sandra was not buried in her car. The anonymous blogger posted photos of Sandra and personal information, including how everyone in the family knew Sandra’s favorite Ferrari was her Daytona 365 GTS/4 Spyder, but that car was more valuable than the baby blue Ferrari. Did the executor of the estate switch Ferraris right before the burial? The blogger declined to discuss anything else about troubled family dynamics, saying only, “She led a helluva life,” before signing off.
Beverly Hills Confidential : A Century of Stars, Scandals and Murders Page 10