by James Ellroy
Munoz dropped 50 feet off that bridge. He hit the concrete floor of the L.A. River bed. The L.A. River is a wide runoff sluice. Note the pools of water from a recent winter rain. Note the dead man’s unkempt state. Extrapolate that he is a wino or hophead or both. Extrapolate that he did die asleep. Extrapolate that he died in the middle of a hop dream. Extrapolate that the dream encompassed the scene of his death.
The L.A. River was a frequent location for horror flicks and films noir. It would go on to provide the climactic backdrop for the ’54 giant-ant masterpiece Them! Maybe Munoz was a dope fiend with prophetic powers. Maybe he was seeing those ants in some draconian dreamscape. They’re chasing him. They want to kill him and eat him. They’ve got giant feelers and giant teeth. Munoz thrashes in his sleep and falls off that beam.
Maybe it wasn’t that. Maybe he just poured the pork to a choice chiquita back in Boyle Heights. Maybe he bopped from her bed and vowed to start his life over. There’s the Aliso Street Bridge. That beam looks like a sweet nesting spot. †
* * *
BROOKS
* * *
DECEMBER 1
We’re in the garage behind the house at 2927 South Rimpau. It’s in the LAPD’s University Division. The area is down at the heels, but not sleazoid. The 10 Freeway will bulldoze cribs near this spot 11 years hence. Right now, a grasshopper named Gilford Brown has got this spot pegged as his launching pad for Cloud 9.
Brown, 37, is Hawaiian by birth. He’s a movie bit player. He’s growing maryjane on his property. That’s a righteous roust in ’53. The Narco cop in the pix is the legendary Pierce Brooks. He’s the policeman as philosopher-king. He’s eyeballing Brown’s marijuana plants, growing outside the garage and draped over a mattress box-spring inside. He’s got a winsome look on his face. He might be wondering why anyone would fuck their life up with dope. He might be pondering Gilford Brown’s psychic disengagement. He might be thinking, “I wish I could transfer to Homicide and slam some real desperadoes.”
Brooks got that wish. He would go on to apprehend sex creep Harvey Glatman in ’58. Glatman was a bondage-rope freak who offed three women in ’57 and ’58. He was a camera fiend who photographed his victims bound and gagged in the moments before he strangled them. Glatman burned in the green room—September ’59. Brooks was there when the pellets dropped.
He went on to the Onion Field job—March ’63. It’s the most celebrated cop-killing in LAPD history. Let’s bop forward to a more recent Then. Ian Campbell and Karl Hettinger are working a felony car out of Hollywood Division. Gregory Powell and Jimmy Smith are a shitbird oreo team of armed robbers. Combustion and horrible misalliance. Bad moon rising. Powell and Smith kidnap Campbell and Hettinger and drive them to a Kern County onion field. They coldly execute Campbell. Hettinger escapes and later has a mental breakdown. Powell and Smith go through a series of trials and escape the righteous justice of the green room. Pierce Brooks retires from the LAPD as a captain. He creates the VICAP program for catching serial psychos and writes books on policework and penology. Pierce Brooks—LAPD’s philosopher-king. He’s rousting a reefer man. What is he thinking? †
* * *
MANUEL
* * *
DECEMBER 12
You’re looking at a forlorn cat named Manuel Vela, age 38. He’s outside a tavern on Erwin Street in Van Nuys. Why is Mr. Vela’s face bandaged? Because he got his ass kicked at the tavern earlier that day. Why is Mr. Vela posed with an unloaded gun in his waistband? Because LAPD detectives are staging a reenactment of Mr. Vela’s assault-with-a-deadly-weapon beef.
Here’s the scoop:
Mr. Vela told the cops that a man named “Joe” pounded him. He was treated for cuts and abrasions at Valley Receiving Hospital and got the big bone for payback. He went home, got his roscoe and returned to the tavern. He stood outside and fired four shots through the front door.
Thomas Castillo, age 51, was hit three times. One slug almost hit his heart. He caught another shot in the hips and a third shot in the back. Whew!—close call—for both Castillo and Vela. Castillo was rushed to County General and survived. Thus, Vela dodged the hot seat at San Quentin.
Joe Martinez, 26, was cut by flying glass. He was treated at Valley Receiving Hospital.
Let’s turn an eye to Manuel Vela. He’s got that rodent-reptile hybrid look, common to street riffraff. He’s hangdog. He’s a loser in love. He’s probably hung like a cashew.
And he looks relieved. It ain’t no gas chamber bounce. He got his picture in the paper. He’ll probably draw a three-spot at Chino and be out in a cool deuce. He looks relieved. He’s heard that Chino’s a sweet deal. He can drink pruno and poke sissies up the brown trail. The food’s good at Chino. Dexter Gordon’s there on a dope jolt and honks sax in the prison band. The cops have been nice to him. They haven’t hit him with a phone book. They keep giving him cigarettes.
Things could be worse. Dig the existential gestalt:
He’s made the big gesture. Now THE MAN will take care of him and tell him what to do.
Crime is individual moral forfeit on an epidemic scale. †
* * *
VANDALS
* * *
NOVEMBER 29
Vandalism.
“Malicious mischief.”
Some punks lug huge pieces of concrete over to a large plate-glass window, late at nite. They look into a high-line women’s store, of the type common to our Then. It’s 11/29/53. The front of the store is full of female mannequins. The vandal or vandals hurl concrete blocks through the glass. The placement of the un-pictured blocks suggests two vandals. They’re sexually driven. They’re impotent and enraged. They enter the store and create a tableau.
They topple a mannequin and pull her arms off. Now, she’s naked and wearing only high heels. Note the seated mannequin. She’s still wearing a pricey mink stole. The vandals did not come to steal.
It’s probably a two-punk caper. It’s got to be. It’s probably teenagers jacked up on model-airplane glue and early-’50s vintage stroke mags. Gent, Knave, Cavalier, Nugget—just enough skin to juice their skin index to THIS!!!!!
Little cocksuckers! LAPD Juvie cops should phone-book these punks and pound them for this perv perfidy!
One mannequin has been folded into a fetal position on the floor. Her blonde wig was dropped a few feet away. Her upper body is mink-stole clad—and only her bald head sticks out.
A mannequin is positioned on her side, facing the window. A dark-colored dress has been pushed up over her hips.
Nightfall.
He Walks by Night.
They Drive by Night.
Film noir. 1953. Provocative women in fetishistic attire. Vandals out at night. Phone-book them and hold them overnight. Have mom and dad make restitution. Write this one off as youthful pervverve. Slam them if they do it again.
But:
It turned out to be a righteous smash-and-grab 459! Desperate B&E men!!! Hopped-up hellions with hot furs to fence!!!
And:
It’s unsolved. †
* * *
288A P.C.
* * *
DECEMBER 18
It’s a week before Christmas ’53. Colored lights are up throughout our beloved Pueblo Grande. Mock-snow-flocked trees adorn Wilshire Boulevard. Whiskey Bill Parker will dress up as Santa Claus at LAPD’s Christmas party for underprivileged kids—and he’ll probably be half in the bag. And Hollywood Division’s got a hot-prowl/sex creep on the loose!
The crime: 288a P.C.—forced oral copulation. The location: 6724 Hollywood Boulevard.
Yeah, motherfuckers—Hollyweird. Home of hepcats, hugger-muggers, hopheads, hypes and hermaphrodite he-shes. And, now, we’ve got this hot-prowl Harry—and he be baaaaaaaaaaad to de bone!
He climbed a fire escape and entered through a narrow bathroom window. He entered in plain view of the bustling Boulevard, all holiday-swarmed. Two detectives are reconstructing the crime. You can tell what they’re thinking. This perv-o is scurvy and skinny—it’s a
tight fit through this window space. One detective is out on a fire escape, gazing westbound. Note the Hollywood Theater marquee on the right. I saw many films noir there as a kid. Dig the elevated perspective. The hot-prowl man climbed a good five stories to get to his prey. The detective stares westbound. He knows the perv has fled. He’s staring out at the neon jungle as the neon jungle stares back. He wants to know Who? He wants to know Why? What corrosive causation coursed before this vile violation, and how does he live with himself?
See that sidewalk Christmas tree? It’s right in the detective’s line of sight. How does such festive expression coexist a heartbeat from horror?
The reconstruction continues. The detectives stand at opposite ends of a long hallway. They’re most likely pondering the perv’s means of escape. They’re standing by the bed where the assault occurred. It’s been freshly made. It’s 1953. The victim is most likely being attended by a police physician. A properly solicitous policewoman is surely standing by. †
* * *
ABORTION
* * *
APRIL 28
It’s 4/28/53. Abortions are euphemized as “illegal operations” in the papers. George R. Davis is a 70-year-old retired osteopath running a clandestine scrape clinic at this home in Highland Park. LAPD’s been investigating him for six months. He aroused suspicion late last year. He testified at the trial of a woman accused of possessing illegal surgical equipment. His testimony secured the woman’s acquittal.
We’re five years shy of David Seville and the Chipmunks’ chart-busting hit “Witch Doctor”—but that’s who this man is.
There’s a full-length mirror in his bedroom. It blocks off a secret operating room with a secret cabinet full of surgical implements. LAPD Detectives Herman Zander, Glen Bates and Danny Galindo pop Davis at his pad/secret clinic, along with a woman identified as his housekeeper. Her tres ’53 name: Hazel Slocum.
“Housekeepers” commonly appear in ’53 police files. They vibe euphemism for “mistress of older, sinister man.” This case presents a case for William H. Parker’s ordered society of Then—decades before the surveillance-camera society of Now.
Davis testified at that woman’s trial the previous year. Said testimony aroused suspicion. Cops are trained in the art of detecting mendacity. Davis vibed un-kosher on the witness stand. Law-enforcement ears perked. Don’t you know when someone’s shitting you? I always do. I’m not a cop. I’ve never wanted to be one. I live to unravel the mysteries of character and motive. So do cops. Look at the Witch Doctor’s orderly home and office. It’s a lurid labyrinth. Theodore Roethke wrote, “Is the stair here? / Where’s the stair? / ‘The stair’s right there, / But it goes nowhere.’ / And the abyss? the abyss? / ‘The abyss you can’t miss. / It’s right where you are— / A step down the stair.’”
* * *
HEPCAT
* * *
MARCH 26
Let’s revisit the kat pictured here. He exemplifies the soundtrack and visual cohort of this book. He’s pure bebop and film noir.
He’s all about the quick rush of titillation and the abandonment to cheap impulse. William H. “Whiskey Bill” Parker hates this motherfucker—and not because he’s black. He hates Ricardo Robert White, alias Rickey White, Negro male American—because he lives a slothful life devoted to SIN.
He’s a hophead, a dope fiend, a junkie, a hype. His daily routine is venally self-serving and meretricious. He’s all capitulation. His very existence is a lie. The hordes of hipsters who buy this book will dig him, nonetheless.
Then/Now, Then/Now, Then/Now.
He looks kool. He’s thin. He’s got a kool Then, kool Now pencil mustache. He plays the sax. He spiels jive talk. He’s straight out of Chester Himes and Iceberg Slim. He’s full of carcinogenic contempt for THE MAN. “Subject does not work, but hangs out in pool halls in the Watts area and around 120th and Central, where he is well known.”
He’s a felonious feline about town. He fulfills our basest urge to morally forfeit. Individual responsibility is a shuck. His kool kat–outlaw look tells us that. Bebop says, “FUCK THE MAN!” Film noir tells us that THE MAN exists solely to squash the poor and muzzle the artist. “Where there is no God, everything is permissible.” Dostoyevsky said that. Ricardo Robert White affirms the horrid pleasures of self-relinquishment. His very being nullifies the fatuous extremes of social critique and extols the wisdom of an unwavering moral compass. What is bebop and film noir abandon to a morally sound person? Three drinks too many and a roll in the hay with someone inappropriate. Ricardo White, living bop and noir Then: thievery, desiccation, abdication.
“Subject plays the saxophone and may be found at jam sessions.”
Get off that pulpit, five-year-old Ellroy! You’re the biggest bop and noir hypocrite in the world! There’s Rickey White, blatting his sax at Club Zombie. That’s you, snapping your fingers and grooving the scene with a spike in your arm! †
* * *
JUMPERS
* * *
JUNE 16 & JULY 3
Jumpers.
6/16/53 and 7/3/53. One Chinese man, one white woman. The man was gravely ill. The woman was “despondent.” The latter is the most commonly ascribed cause of suicide. It covers everything from skunk marriage to postpartum depression to loopy loss of love. “Ill health” is right up there. It requires no further explanation. There’s no known cure for ailments from cancer to the creeping crud. It hurts to live. You’re anxious to get there—however you view the prospect of “THERE.” These two jobs are pure impulse. The jumpers did not purchase rope, score pills, rig up an elaborate asphyxiation tableau. They simply leaped.
Jan Joy was a 40-year-old Chinese man. He checked into the Northern Hotel at 2nd and Clay on Bunker Hill. He left a note behind. It was written in Chinese. The translation: “Been sick long time. No cure. No way out.”
Yeah, baby! There’s NO EXIT!!!!! It’s sock-it-to-me Sartre—that freaky frog—all the way!!!!! Jump, baby, jump!
Cut to 7/3/53. Ruth K. Wilson, age 46, jumps from the ninth floor of L.A.’s vividly venerable Biltmore Hotel. Miss Wilson worked in a café a few blocks away. Nix “despondent”—she had the L.A. blues baaaaaaaaaaaad.
Here’s the skinny, the gist, the gestating gestalt:
You’re like William Bendix in The Blue Dahlia. You’re hearing that meshugana monkey music in your head. The record’s stuck in a groove you can’t unhitch. It’s urging you toward an irrevocable act. You’re Lee Harvey Oswald, John Wilkes Booth, Sirhan Sirhan and that anarchist fuck who shot President William McKinley. You’re hearing that same terrible tune that all assassins hear. Anything beats the stagnant stasis of life on planet earth. Look, world—I’m here. Look, world—I’m gone.
And—you might survive the jump. You’re trusting fate or some divine source. Your flight and hard landing just might jolt you into a wild new good-luck life.
Yeah, but not these two. †
Suicide, June 16, Downtown
* * *
GREENBERG
* * *
JUNE 16
George Delbert Greenberg had had enough. He had a bargain basement .38 caliber Iver Johnson revolver and an innocuous late-model Chevy coupe. He was married. His wife’s name was Margaret. They had a pad on Manchester Boulevard, back when that hell-bound hood was hunky-dory. There’s no known backstory on George Delbert Greenberg. His death did not make the papers. All we have is the coroner’s register one-sheet and the pix.
He drove down to the oil fields at 132nd and Figueroa. We’re out of darktown and into Gardena. Greenberg traversed a dirt road and found a spot with some privacy. He stood by the driver’s-side door of the Chevy and shot himself in the chest. He slumped to the ground, with his head wedged between the door and the car seat.
He was only 28. The death pose suggests supplication. The chest wound suggests a broken heart more than a head wound would suggest the urgent need to extinguish all consciousness. What heartsickness could be so ghastly as to preempt the ide
a of all future heart happiness? “Despondency” is listed as the cause of the suicide. It’s an insufficient explanation.
Who was this guy?
The “Delbert” doesn’t go with the “Greenberg.” Was he Jewish? Was he wigged out from World War II or Korea? Did he have too many kids or too much responsibility too soon, and thus fall behind the crush of his lost youth? Was Margaret cheating on him? Was he cheating on Margaret? Was his girlfriend pregnant and laying down the ultimatum of “her or me”? The Rosenbergs just burned at Sing Sing. Was George Delbert Greenberg wigged over that?
He’d had enough. Maybe he just choked on garden-variety self-pity. The world wasn’t going his way. Fuck it—I’ll show the world I don’t need it. Look at that midshot/close-up. It’s a fastidious pose. The gun is pointing outward. It’s barely visible—but it’s warning us not to take shit so hard. †
* * *
METAPHYSIC
* * *
SEPTEMBER 24
Douglas DeVorss published “metaphysical” books and sold them out of his own downtown bookshop. The façade bore the painted slogan “Books that inspire success.” Success at what? Was DeVorss a fast-buck, positive-thinking guy? A swoony swami? A rasty Rosicrucian or a zorched-out Zoroastrian? All his office help was felicitously female. Was he a girl-gone guru, running some kind of poontang pyramid scheme in his head? How did he wind up shot dead?
The estranged husband of DeVorss’s housekeeper plugged him. It’s all madcap middle-aged mischief. DeVorss was 53. The killer—Walter Henry “Jack” Kruse—was 52. The housekeeper—Hazel Mary Kruse—was 45. Mr. Kruse was a former Minneapolis mailman on the skids. Mrs. Kruse told LAPD detectives that he was a “psychopathic case” who had been threatening to kill her and her children, and that she had been afraid of him throughout the 27 years of their marriage. Woo, woo—this job has marital mishigas stamped all over it! DeVorss was in marital mourning. His much-younger wife died during childbirth on 6/1/53. He met Mrs. Kruse six weeks before his own death. She told him that she was deathly afraid of her husband and leaned on his shoulder. He installed her as the “Housekeeper” at his millionaire’s metaphysical mansion in Pasadena. Walter Henry “Jack” Kruse got wind of it. Shit turned south from there. Bam!—there’s Doug DeVorss, dead.