Crime Buff's Guide to Outlaw Los Angeles
Ron Franscell
WildBlue Press, 2017
WildBlue Press, 2017
Review by Robert A. Waters
In the city of dreams,
nightmares haunt its sad streets like a plague. For everyone who
makes it big, thousands, maybe millions, fail. Most do not revert to
crime, but Crime Buff's Guide to Outlaw Los Angeles describes several hundred who did. There's the
brutal, the wacky, and the mysterious crimes solved and unsolved.
And, as an added bonus for the visitor or researcher, you can turn on
your GPS and head directly to where these murders unfolded.
Los Angeles is unlike most
cities. It was built on fantasy, and continues to enthrall the
masses in the heartland. Film stars live in mansions while ghettoes
steam like volcanoes ready to explode. But whether you live the high
life or the low life, almost everyone seems dependent on some form of
illicit drug.
Even the stars who have fame
and ka-trillions of dollars can't seem to hold their lives together.
The first story in Outlaw Los Angeles describes the murder of
Lana Clarkson. A waitress at a high end bar, the House of Blues,
Clarkson's dreams of movie stardom was fading with each passing year.
So when music mogul Phil Spector entered the restaurant, Clarkson
may have felt a spark of hope. When he insisted that she come home
with him, she did so. Sometime during the night, a gunshot rang out
and Lana Clarkson ate a .38-caliber slug. After two trials, Spector
was convicted of second-degree murder. It turns out that the
world-famous music producer hated being alone, and may have killed
Clarkson because she saw how weird he was and wanted to leave.
When a celebrity dies,
cover-ups are the norm. George Reeves, AKA Superman, committed
suicide. Or did he? Gangster and serial wife-beater Johnny
Stompanato was killed by Lana Turner's fourteen-year-old daughter,
Cheryl Crane. Or was he? Marilyn Monroe overdosed. Or did she?
Some of the world's best
defense attorneys seem to reside in LA for one purpose: to keep the
stars out of prison. Robert “In Cold Blood” Blake was tried for
killing his grifter wife, Bonnie Lee Bakley, but he was acquitted,
leaving many questions unanswered. Michael Jackson beat the rap on
child molestation charges. O. J. Simpson's acquittal shook America but launched the careers of several lawyers.
What happens when the
world's biggest porn star becomes diseased and impotent? Since this is
Hollywood, he turns to buying, selling, and using cocaine. Coke eats
into bank accounts like cancer, so John Holmes soon became desperate
for a quick cash fix. Cops accused him of setting up the robbery and
brutal murders of his dealer and the dealer's cronies. Or did he
commit the murders himself? We'll never know because Holmes was
acquitted of the murders. But he wasn't acquitted of AIDS—he died
of the disease a few years after his trial.
Serial killers flock to LA
like vultures. The Hillside Stranglers. The Lonely Hearts Killer.
Richard Ramirez, the Night Stalker. But one of the strangest was
Rodney Alcala. A creepy-looking dude, he actually appeared on The
Dating Game...and WON—while he
was wanted for child-rape and attempted murder. Alcala eventually
plea-bargained those charges down to 38 months. As soon as he was out
on the streets, he assaulted a schoolgirl and served two more years
behind bars. Before he was caught the final time, he had murdered
seven women and girls. Alcala currently sits on California's unused
Death Row.
Outlaw Los Angeles
is one of those books you can't put down. Every page seems more
interesting than the last, and when the reader finishes reading it,
he wants to contact the author and ask for Outlaw Los
Angeles II.
