L.A. Noir (67 page)

Parker was becoming more: Fumed Parker, “They [the police] were being blamed for all the ills of humanity; they were constantly being bombarded, and I have been nothing but harassed by these elements since I was chief of police. I have been sued repeatedly. I have a suit pending now in the Federal court under the Federal Civil Rights Act.”

Sitting in the audience: In response to a question from Commissioner Johnson about integration in the department, Parker insisted, in effect, that the department already was integrated—but in a very sly fashion. “Officers may be assigned together and sometimes they are, but not as a matter of discrimination, no …” the Chief replied. Consciously mingling partners would be nothing more than “reverse discrimination.” Parker attempted a similar move when asked to name the highest-ranking black officers in the department. Parker pointed to Lt Roscoe Washington and said the only thing holding him back was his performance on the
written
exam—this despite the fact that black officers routinely received low
oral
evaluations. By insisting the problem was a written exam—no bias there!—Parker was, with lawyerly skill, deflecting attention away from the problem of orals scores.

Never slow to respond: “Racial Bias Accusations False, Says Chief Parker. Explains Police Problem,”
Los Angeles Mirror-News
, January 27, 1960, A.

It didn’t. Forced to: “Council Hears Parker’s Recording on ‘Wild Tribes,’ Chief Denies Slur, Refuses to Apologize,”
Los Angeles Times
, February 3, 1960. See also “Demagoguery Loses a Round,”
Los Angeles Times
, February 5, 1960.

“Girls very often like …”: Hecht manuscript, 39 Hecht Papers, Newberry Library.

The rules were strict: “Lid Off L.A.!” Coates,
Los Angeles Mirror-News
, February 15, 1952.

Candy Barr was striptease: Shteir,
Striptease
, 297.

Ordinary women were a: Lewis,
Hollywood’s Celebrity Gangster
, xii-xiii.

By the spring of: Ryan, “Dot-dot-dot—It’s Just Like Downtown,”
Los Angeles Times
, April 20, 1959, B5.

Renay had long been: “Liz Renay Indicted on Perjury Charges: Mickey Cohen’s Actress Friend Accused of Lying About Raising $5,500 in Loans,”
Los Angeles Times
, March 13, 1959, 4.

Inwardly, Mickey grieved: Hulse, “Mickey Cohen to Wed Striptease Dancer, 22,”
Los Angeles Times
, October 2, 1959, 4.

On December 2, 1959: “Cohen Suspect in Slaying, Restaurant’s Guests Flee After Shooting,”
Los Angeles Mirror-News
, December 3, 1959; Cohen, “Cohen’s Own Story of Cafe Shooting,”
Los Angeles Herald
, December 3, 1959. For more background on Whalen, see also Lieberman, “Cop Befriends a Crook,”
Los Angeles Times
, October 29, 2008.

“A man walked in …”: Korman, “Hoodlum Shot to Death, Victim Ripe for Killing, Police Report,”
Chicago Daily Tribune
, December 4, 1950, 14.

“Obviously, he is,”: “Shooting Takes Place Six Feet from Mickey,”
Los Angeles Mirror-News
, December 3, 1958.

The police then got: “Mickey Cohen Jailed in Murder of Bookie,”
Los Angeles Times
, December 4, 1959, 1.

Six days later: “Slayer of Bookmaker Surrenders to Police,”
Los Angeles Times
, December 9, 1959, 1.

Brown called in Chief: “Witnesses Deny They Saw Whalen Shooting,”
Los Angeles Times
, March 11, 1960, B32. See also Lieberman, “Noir Justice Catches Up with Mickey Cohen,”
Los Angeles Times
, November 1, 2008; “Admits Slaying Bookie, Claims It Was ‘Self Defense,’”
Los Angeles Examiner
, December 9, 1959.

Prosecutors tried to put: Lieberman, “Noir Justice Catches Up with Mickey Cohen,”
Los Angeles Times
, November 1, 2008.

The Whalen shooting quickly: Blake, “First Such Convention in City Brings With It Host of New Problems,”
Los Angeles Times
, May 30, 1960.

The convention began under: “Kennedy’s ‘Pad’ in L.A.—Dirty Shirts and Disorder,”
San Francisco Call-Bulletin
, July 15, 1960.

From the start, Parker: “Noise, Cheers, Applause, Songs—and 3 Candidates,”
Kansas City Times
, April 11, 1960; “Big Squeeze Boosts Police for Kennedy,”
Los Angeles Mirror
, July 11, 1960.

The LAPD also proved: Fleming, “Stevenson Supporters Try to Invade Arena, Extra Police Rushed to Entrance as Chanting Crowd of 600 Mills About,”
Los Angeles Times
, July 14, 1960.

By all accounts, the: See, for instance, “The Bright Badge of the L.A.P.D.,”
Los Angeles Times
editorial, August 9, 1960, B4.

“Eating out of the …”: Russo,
The Outfit
, 407.

Parker was delighted.: “Parker Hails Kennedy as Crime Foe,”
Los Angeles Times
, December 17, 1960, 12; “Chief Parker May Head US Crime Probers,”
Los Angeles Herald-Express
, December 22, 1960.

To the sixty-six: Thomas,
Robert Kennedy: His Life
, 114.

“I have a high: “Chief Parker May Head US Crime Probers,”
Los Angeles Herald-Express
, December 22, 1960; White, “Parker Takes Swipe at FBI,”
Los Angeles Mirror
, December 22, 1960.

Ethel was a prankster: Thomas,
Robert Kennedy: His Life
, 117.

To Mickey Cohen, the: More specifically, prosecutors charged Cohen with evading roughly $30,000 in taxes between 1956 and 1958 and also with avoiding another $347,000 in taxes (plus interest and penalties) between 1945 and 1950, in addition to several other infringements of the law. See Korman, “Convict Cohen a Second Time Tax Offender: Guilty of Beating U.S. out of $400,000,”
Chicago Tribune
, July 1, 1961, 3. Cohen’s previous tax conviction had been for avoiding $130,000 in taxes between 1946 and 1948. The decision to charge Cohen with concealing even more income in the immediate postwar years reflected new discoveries about Cohen’s gambling income from that era.

“There’s no question about…”: Cohen,
In My Own Words
, 195-96.

The first investor appeared: “Cohen’s Story Contract Presented at His Trial,”
Los Angeles Times
, May 19, 1961, 30; “$9,000 Advance for Cohen, Screenplay Told,”
Los Angeles Times
, May 20, 1961, 11; Korman, “2
FILM COMICS ADD SPICE TO COHEN’S TRIAL:
Jerry Lewis, Skelton on Witness Stand,”
Chicago Daily Tribune
, May 25, 1961, A7; “Ben Hecht Sees Cohen as Top Book Material,”
Los Angeles Times
, May 18, 1961, B2.

The next witness after: “Candy Barr Tells About Being Cohen’s ‘Sweetie:’ Jailed Stripper Testifies How Ex-Hoodlum Helped Her Flee U.S. to Mexico Hide-way,”
Los Angeles Times
, June 3, 1961, 12.

The answer was yes: Caen, “Another World: Search for the Prize Topper,”
Los Angeles Times
, June 15, 1960, B5; “US. Rests Cohen Income Tax Case,”
Los Angeles Times
, June 17, 1961, 9.

“I feel it’s now …”: “Cohen Defense Claims He Was Losing Money,”
Los Angeles Times
, June 24, 1961, 11.

Mickey responded by instructing: Cohen,
In My Own Words
, 205.

Reporters noted that he: “Mickey Cohen Jaunty Again—in Volkswagen,”
Los Angeles Times
, October 20, 1961, 26.

Then, two weeks later: “Mickey Cohen, 4 Others Indicted in Murder Plot, All Accused in Dec. 2, 1959 Slaying of Jack Whalen in Sherman Oaks Cafe,”
Los Angeles Times
, November 1, 1961, 2.

“‘Civil disobedience’… simply means …”: Manion, “Anarchy Imminent,” May 30, 1965.

Police lieutenant Tom Bradley: Indeed, Bradley’s promotion and appointment to Wilshire Division was widely seen as a promotion in the black community. Lomax, “Bradley Makes ‘Loot,’ Just in Time for the Vote on the Police Pay Raise,”
Los Angeles Tribune
, October 31, 1958.

Poulson, meanwhile, struggled with: Los Angeles has nonpartisan primaries. Any candidate who wins more than 50 percent of the vote in the primary automatically wins election to the office in question. If no candidate wins an outright majority, then the two top vote-getters meet for a rematch in the
general election. The top vote-getter in that election then claims the contested office.

In his public appearances: See “All Elections Promises Kept, Yorty Asserts. But Black Leaders Flat Contradict His Claim That He Never Promised to Fire Chief Parker,”
Los Angeles Herald-Examiner
, July 9, 1962.

In fact, Yorty did: Ainsworth,
Maverick Mayor
, 129, 132-33.

The next day, newspapers:
Los Angeles Times
, June 9, 1961. See “Two Cited Under Lynch Law After Park Riot,”
Los Angeles Times
, June 2, 1961, for an account of the case. See also “This Is not Alabama,”
Los Angeles Times
editorial, June 1, 1960.

“I have confidence in…”: Gottlieb and Wolt,
Thinking Big
, 364-65; “Yorty, Parker Clash: Chief Denies Charge of Ballot ‘Gestapo,’”
Los Angeles Examiner
, June 9, 1961.

Rumor had it that: The rumor seems to have started with councilman Carl Rundberg, who after the mayor and police chief’s meeting, expressed a desire to know “what Parker had on Yorty.” Parker denied the allegation, but Rundberg rejoined that he personally had heard Parker play back recordings of negative remarks made by Yorty about the police. See
Hollywood Citizen-News
, February 18, 1963.
Daryl Gates would later categorically deny that Parker collected dirt on Yorty and other politicians. Perhaps this is true (although Yorty’s allegations seem similar to those leveled by Norris Poulson in 1952). What is striking, though, is that most observers at the time believed he did and feared the chief accordingly. Author interview with Daryl Gates, December 10, 2004.

The officers had heard: “Six Muslim Suspects Held in Row at Market,”
Los Angeles Times
, September 3, 1961; Branch,
Pillar of Fire
, 4-15.

Malcolm X’s efforts put: Branch,
Pillar of Fire
, 11. See
Los Angeles Sentinel
, May 17, 1962, for a slightly different account.

In early June, a: Woods, “The Progressives and the Police,” 476.

“The Negro community here …”: “Parker Assails Bishop’s View of Negro Policy,”
Los Angeles Times
, January 18, 1963, A1.

“This city can’t be …”: Woods, “The Progressives and the Police,” 475-76.

“Don’t worry”: Cohen,
In My Own Words
, 214.

Cohen’s indictment arose from: Reid,
Mickey Cohen
, 69; “Officers Out to Get Cohen, LoCigno Says,”
Los Angeles Times
, March 22, 1962, A2.

Although he was willing: “Under Table, Didn’t See Slayer, Cohen Says,”
Los Angeles Times
, March 29, 1962, 30.

Cohen’s attorneys did not: “Cohen’s Defense Closes Murder Trial Argument,”
Los Angeles Times
, April 5, 1962, 34.

“This is a crazy town…”: Coates, “A Cool Customer in a Hot Spot,”
Los Angeles Times
, April 15, 1962, B7.

“Although much testimony of…”: “Mickey Cohen Murder Charges Dismissed,”
Los Angeles Times
, March 19, 1962, 2. LoCigno’s earlier conviction had been vacated by an appeals court. However, he did not go free. Later that fall, he was convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to one to ten years’ imprisonment. “Lo Cigno Rules Guilty of Manslaughter,”
Los Angeles Times
, November 15, 1962, B8.

Cohen had dodged the: Lewis,
Hollywood’s Celebrity Gangster
, 278-79, 280-81.

“Don’t worry about me,”: Cohen,
In My Own Words
, 214.

In October, Cohen was: “Mickey Cohen Sues U.S.,”
New York Times
, February 18, 1964, 22; Lewis,
Hollywood’s Celebrity Gangster
, 284-86.

“Violence in Los Angeles …”: “An Analysis of the McCone Commission Report,” California Advisory Committee to the United States Commission on Civil Rights, January 1966, LAPD official records box 84638, CRC.

“I doubt that Los …”: “Police Chief William H. Parker Speaks,” a compilation of Parker statements prepared by the Community Relations Conference of Southern California, 2400 South Western Avenue, Los Angeles, California, available in Parker’s FBI file, 62-96042-109.

“This community has done …”: Woods, “The Progressives and the Police,” 475-76.

Minikus told Marquette that: My account of the beginning of the riots comes from Robert Conot’s
Rivers of Blood, Years of Darkness
(6-29) and from the Governor’s Commission on the Los Angeles Riots report (the so-called McCone Commission), issued December 5, 1965, reprinted in Robert Fogelson, ed.,
Mass Violence in America
(10-23). Frye would later challenge this account, claiming that the Highway Patrol officer had been preparing to release him until other officers arrived with a nastier attitude. See Horne,
The Fire Next Time
, 54.