Crime Wave Part 1

Crime Wave.

James Ellroy.

INTRODUCTION.

by Art Cooper, Editor-in-Chief, GQ.

It was love at first sight. I first met James Ellroy in the fall of 1993 at The Four Seasons restaurant, a midtown Manhattan mecca for publishing poobahs where lunch for two can easily exceed the advance for a first novel. The first word James uttered was "Woof!"--and thus did the Demon Dog of American Literature enter my life and GQ's. In the five years since, James has contributed some of the finest journalism and fiction we have published, and all of it is included in this volume. Contrary to the convention that writers make their names in magazines before turning to books, James was at the top of his game as a novelist when he decided to try magazine writing.

James is a big man with a big voice and a big personality. Those who don't know him well find him intimidating. So do those who know him well. And he is fearless as a Doberman, which I discovered early on when we were trying to decide on a perfect story. Having admired his The Black Dahlia, I acknowledged my own fascination with Hollywood murders of the '4os and '50s. The conversation went something like this: ME: You know, some Miss Idaho goes to Hollywood to be a star, doesn't make it, works as a c.o.c.ktail lounge waitress or a hooker, and winds up horribly and mysteriously murdered. JAMES: Well, I'm obsessed by an unsolved murder. My mother was murdered when I was 10. She had been drinking in some bar and left with a guy. They found her body on an access road by a high school. She had been strangled. They never found who did it. ME (excitedly): That's it! Write your obsession. Reinvestigate it. Write it. Right away. JAMES: Yes, G.o.dfather. (He calls me G.o.dfather all the time. I like it. It makes me feel well-tailored.) I didn't find out until a couple of years later that James went immediately from my office to visit with his agent, Nat Sobel, a wise, compa.s.sionate man on every occasion but this one. Art wants me to write about my mother's murder, said James. Don't do it, advised Nat. It will dredge up a lot that I don't think you want to confront. I'm gonna do it, said the Doberman. The article, "My Mother's Killer," appeared in our August 1994 issue and was one of the most widely praised magazine pieces of that year. James later expanded the piece into his bestselling memoir My Dark Places.

I am not alone in thinking that everything that James has written, indeed his very essence, has been shaped by the murder of Geneva Hilliker Ellroy. He acknowledges as much when writing of her in "My Mother's Killer": "The woman refused to grant me a reprieve. Her grounds were simple: My death gave you a voice, and I need you to recognize me past your exploitation of it." James inscribed my copy of My Dark Places "She lives!"

Accompanying the article there was a photograph of James just after he has been told of his mother's death. Look at his eyes. They are shocked, uncomprehending. Raised by his father, a rakish "Hollywood bottom feeder" (James's words), who did or did not "pour the pork" to Rita Hayworth, James grew to be a teen punk, a peeping torn and a petty thief who broke into houses to sniff women's panties. He filed away, in his mind, everything he saw when he was strung out on drugs or drunk on cheap booze or spending nine months in local lockups--nightmarish, photographic visions that would fuel his noirish fiction.

These complex tales of Los Angeles's seamy underside provide the truest social history of the city in the 1940s and '50s, an era of "bad white men doing bad tings in the name of authority." Ellroy's stories are as dense as an overcrowded prison, but his syiicopated style is deceptive: short, staccato, often alliterative bursts. But they are not riffs. Each muscular sentence follows the next and orderly advances the plot. His protagonists are deeply wounded men on both sides of the law, scarred and corrupted by what they have seen.

James had achieved a reputation as the best American hardboiled crime writer when his novel L.A. Confidential was turned into a critical and commercial hit movie, which happily introduced him to a much larger audience. He writes about that experience here in "Bad Boys in Tinseltown." In this volume, too, are three short fictions that continue where L.A. Confidential ended: "Hollywood Shakedown," "Hush-Hush," and "Tijuana, Mon Amour." James reprises Danny Getch.e.l.l, the cannily corrupt star writer of Hush-Hush magazine, who has the grisly goods on almost everyone in Tinseltown and will blackmail anyone to obtain exclusive dirt. Ellroy gleefully dips in the muck his band of merry miscreants, including Jack Webb, Mickey Cohen, Frank Sinatra, Lana Turner, Johnny Stompanato, d.i.c.k Contino, Sammy Davis Jr., Oscar Levant, and Rock Hudson. There is a raunchy ring of verisimilitude, a truly bizarre believability, to the way Ellroy makes them behave.

Two years ago I hosted a dinner party at The Four Seasons for another '5os icon, 7 1-year-old Tony Curtis, who arrived wearing a ruffled white shirt, a tuxedo jacket without lapels, a medal from the French government on his chest, and his stunning 2 6-yearold, 6'1" girlfriend, Jill Van Den Berg, on his arm. James was there as were Tom Junod, who had written a brilliant profile of Curtis for GQ, and an editor whose name will come to me in a moment. When I suggested that Tony be seated away from the other diners, James thought it would be better if he sat near them. James, of course, was right. All evening, middle-aged suburban matrons fawned over Tony, pleaded for his autograph, touched him, told him he was the handsomest movie star ever.

We drank some surpa.s.singly good wine, laughed a lot, and listened raptly to Tony and James, back and forth like a shuttlec.o.c.k, tell ribald tales of Hollywood in the '5os. It became clear to me that no one alive knows more than James about that particular time in that particular place. He seems to know everything about the famous, the near-famous, and the infamous. Especially their p.e.n.i.s size. His novels, like his conversation, abound with references to it. Some of his characters are "hung like a donkey," others "like a cashew." Why he is so obsessed is best left to Freudians, but for Ellroy, more than any other writer, anatomy is truly destiny.

Ellroy's destiny was to be a moralist. But he doesn't ride his moralism like some hobbyhorse. When he is outraged by some wrongdoing, he gets really juiced. Shortly after 0. J. Simpson committed the double-slash of ex-wife Nicole and her friend, Ron Goldman, I asked James if he'd write an essay on the Crime of the Century. Yes, indeed, he replied. The result made the hair on the back of my neck stand up. "s.e.x, Glitz, and Greed: The Seduction of 0. J. Simpson" is a pa.s.sionate, powerful piece that skewers Simpson and the horrific Hollywood celebrity culture that sp.a.w.ned him. Several months ago, James was in moral high dudgeon again, this time outraged at Bill Clinton's s.e.xual dalliance with Monica Lewinsky and his rather bizarre p.r.o.nouncement that a b.l.o.w. .j.o.b really isn't s.e.x. James was itching to rip Bubba, and I, perhaps unwisely, declined.

This white-hot morality and a singular narrative gift aside, I think James has become one of the finest writers of our time because he is the most disciplined scrivener I have ever known. He rises early and spends io hours every day writing. He has never been blocked. He seems always to be juggling a novel, short fiction, and his magazine work. Astonishingly, he has never missed a deadline. He possesses the concentration--and the confidence--of a cat burglar; the outline of his novel-in-progress runs 343 pages.

Genius has its rewards. Ellroy now commands advances robust enough to dine regularly at The Four Seasons. Last October he flew from his home in Kansas City to New York where, resplendent in black tie (James is some bespoke dandy), he accepted GQ's Man of the Year Award for Literature, for which he was selected by our ferociously intelligent readers. The two previous winners are Norman Mailer and John Updike. Mr. Mailer and Mr. Updike should feel flattered.

BODY DUMPS.

DETECTIVE DIVISION/HOMICIDE BUREAU/LOS ANGELES COUNTY SHERIFF'S DEPARTMENT (EL MONTE PD a.s.sISTING). VICTIM: SCALES, BETTYJEAN. DOD: 1/29/73. DISPOSITION: MURDER/187 PC. FILE #073-01946-2010400 (UNSOLVED).

I.

The victim was a 24-year-old white female. She lived at 2633 Cogswell, El Monte. The city was downscale. The racial mix was white trash and low-rent Latin.

The victim was married to William David Scales--a 26-year-old white male. They had a 4-year-old daughter and a 3-monthold son. The victim was unemployed. Her husband installed insulation.

8:00 P.M. Monday, 1/29/73: The victim leaves her apartment. She's alone. Her stated intention: to deposit some checks at a bank night drop and shop at Durfee Drugs and Crawford's Market. She takes off in her husband's Ford pickup. Scales stays home. He watches the kids and checks out the Laugh-In TV show.

The bank is a block from the market. Durfee Drugs is one mile west. Their apartment sits equidistant.

It's a tight local spread. Scales figures his wife will be gone one hour.

9:00, 9:30, 10:00. No Betty Jean. The baby wants food. Scales feeds him and slaps on fresh diapers. He's ticked off and worried. He's working on p.i.s.sed off and scared. He starts running abandonment tapes.

Betty left me and the kids. Betty stuck me with the kids. Betty's got a boyfriend. They're at his place or a bar or a motel. They're bopping at the Nashville West.

He calmed down. He switched tapes. Betty needs some time by herself.

To unwind. To cut loose. To visit her girlfriends.

He called Connie, Terry, and Glenda. They said they hadn't seen Betty, He ran tapes from 10:30 to midnight. He called the El Monte PD and the California Highway Patrol. He described his truck and his wife. He asked about car wrecks.

No go: Your truck was not involved in any reported collisions.

He ran crash tapes to 2:oo A.M. He called the El Monte PD back. He got another No. The desk man said sit tight and wait by the phone.

He tried to sit tight. The tapes kept spinning. He left his kids alone and walked by Crawford's Market and the Nashville West. They were closed. He didn't see his wife or his truck. He walked home. He called the girlfriends again. He got three more No's. He fell asleep on the couch and woke up at 5:30. He called Betty Jean's dad in Corona. Bud Bedford said he hadn't seen or heard from BettyJean. He said he'd shoot up to El Monte.

Bill Scales and Bud Bedford connected. They drove by Durfee Drugs, the bank, and the market. They did not see Betty Jean or the truck. They drove to the El Monte PD. They filed a missingpersons sheet. Scales said his wife was devoted. She wasn't a runaround chick. She didn't smoke dope or chase men. She wouldn't just split unannounced.

The cops told Scales and Bedford to sit tight. Don't think car wrecks or abductions. We're legally constrained until your wife is gone forty-eight hours. Think car wrecks or abductions then.

Bill Scales thought it now. Bud Bedford thought it. They did not sit tight.

They drove the #10 Freeway east/west. They drove the 605 north/south. They stopped at gas stations. They talked to attendants. They described Betty Jean and the truck. Scales got a bug up his a.s.s. He knew his wife was kidnapped. He knew the guy stopped to gas up.

More No's. No's straight across. No Betty Jean/no truck.

Bedford went home. He'd divorced Betty's mother years back. He had to break the news and say it don't look good.

Scales stuck the kids with a baby-sitter. He borrowed a car and went at the freeways systematically. He hit gas stations. He flashed a snapshot of Betty. He got a straight run of No's.

Wednesday, 1/3 1/73: The missing-persons investigation kicked in pro forma. An APB went out. A Teletype detailed the truck and Betty Jean Scales: WF/DOB 3/6/49, 54", 115, brown hair, brown eyes. Last seen wearing a red-pink top, brown Levi's, and white tennis shoes.

1:30A.M. Thursday, 2/1/73: An El Monte PD unit spots the truck. It's parked in the lot at Vons Market. The location: Peck Road and Lower Azusa. The location: two miles north of 2633 Cogswell. The location: 2.5 miles north of Durfee Drugs, the bank, and Crawford's Market.

A patrolman impounds the truck. He tows it to a yard in South El Monte. He talks to a clerk at Vons Market. The clerk says the truck was in the lot at least forty-eight hours. He noticed it around 4:oo A.M.--Tuesday, 1/30.

Eight hours after BettyJean left her apartment.

The El Monte PD contacts Sheriff's Homicide. The Scales thing vibes murder. Deputy Hal Meyers and Sergeant Lee Koury drive to the tow yard.

They examine the truck.

In the bed: metal scaffolds, a milk crate, an empty cardboard box, a leather tool holder, a matching belt, and a length of rope. In the cab: three bottles of baby formula in a small box. A purse, a white bra, white panties, one left-foot white tennis shoe, and a pair of brown Levi's.

The box is on the floor. The clothes are stacked beside it.

Koury and Meyers look under the seat. They find the matching shoe. A key ring is tucked inside. They note a blood spot on the canvas.

On the seat: a red-pink sweater. Distinct bloodstains. A toolbox on the step by the pa.s.senger door. Blood spotted.

More bloodwork: Smears on the seat back. Spatters on the inside of the pa.s.senger door. Drops on the step near the toolbox.

Koury called the crime lab and told them to send out a crew. Meyers opened the purse. He found cosmetic items, three checks made out to William D. Scales, Betty Jean Scales's ID, and a checkbook. The last check logged in: $9.71, to Durfee Drugs, 1/29/73. Meyers checked the box on the floor. He found a cashregister receipt for $9.71. Koury called the EL Monte PD and told them to contact the husband.

The lab crew arrived. A print man dusted the truck inside and out. He found no latent prints. He found wipe marks on the steering wheel and dashboard. A man sc.r.a.ped blood samples and cut a swatch out of the seat back. He found a long brown hair congealed in a blood smear.

1:30 P.M., 2/1/73:.

Koury and Meyers meet Bill Scales at the El Monte PD. Scales recounts his wife's Monday-night plans. He runs down his own actions and describes his marriage as stable.

3:30 P.M., 2/1/73:.

Koury and Meyers drive to Durfee Drugs. They interview a clerk named Gloria Terrazas. Mrs. Terrazas ID's a photo of the probable victim and says she came in about 8:30 Monday night. She purchased some baby formula and paid by check. She came in and left alone. She behaved in a normal fashion.

4:00 P.M., 2/1/73:.

Koury and Meyers drive to Crawford's Market. They grill the people working Monday night. They flash a photo of the probable victim. They say, "When was the last time you saw her?" They get a straight consensus: She did not come in Monday night.

It looks tight and local. The probable victim leaves her pad and drives to Durfee Drugs. She never gets to Crawford's or the bank. Her deposit-ready checks are still in her purse. It looks like a s.n.a.t.c.h. The guy grabs her outside Durfee Drugs or en route to the bank and Crawford's. He hijacks the truck. He dumps her and dumps the truck at Vons Market. The truck was in the lot from 4:00 A.M. Tuesday on.

Or it's the husband.

6:oo P.M., 2/1/73: Koury and Meyers meet Bill Scales at the tow yard. Scales ID's his truck and the items in the bed. He points to the empty box. He says his staple-bat is missing. It's very heavy. Maybe the guy beat his wife to death with it.

Koury and Meyers look at Scales real close.

Scales looks in the cab. He spots some gravel on the floor. He extrapolates.

Some clown kidnapped his wife. He beat her to death with his staple-bat and dumped her in the Irwindale pits.

It's a good theory.

Koury and Meyers make Bill Scales as one cold motherf.u.c.ker.

The Irwindale gravel pits ran northeast of El Monte. They bordered the 6o5 Freeway. They covered twenty-four square miles. They fused with flood-control basins and brushland.

The pits ran fifteen to 150 feet deep. Paved roads connected them. Street access was cake. You could pull off east-west thoroughfares and drive right in.

The pits looked psychedelic. Scoop cranes hung over them all day and all night. Rainfall turned the pits into tide pools. Water collected and receded at a very slow rate.

Heavy rain hit L.A. that winter. The pit floors were submerged. The pit line began 1 .5 miles east of Vons Market.

The Scales thing vibed body dump. The cops figured she was down in the pits.

Friday, 2/2/73: A search team goes in. Deployed: one Sheriff's helicopter, ten deputies, three El Monte PD men, and three Sheriff's Homicide men. The chopper flies low. The cops kick through wet gravel all day.

Sat.u.r.day, 2/3/73: The search resumes. Deployed: one chopper, seven deputies, two El Monte PD men, four Sheriff's Homicide men and 103 hors.e.m.e.n from the Sheriff's Mounted Posse. The search area is greatly expanded. It covers El Monte, Baldwin Park, Irwindale, Azusa, Arcadia, and unincorporated parts of L.A. County, The chopper flies low. The walking cops wear hip boots. The horses buck knee-high water. A storm hits at 3:00 P.M. The search is called off.

The storms continued. Big rain on Sunday and Monday. The search was postponed indefinitely. They had to let the water recede.

Koury and Meyers called it a s.n.a.t.c.h, rape, and kill. They leaned on registered s.e.x offenders. They logged in zero suspects.

They door-to-doored by Durfee Drugs and Vons Market. They tapped out. n.o.body saw anything. They interviewed the probable victim's father, mother, stepfather, stepmother, and brother. The father and mother ragged the husband: He's a lowlife. He's a tyrant. He's a cold son of a b.i.t.c.h. Bud Bedford says it flat out: He killed Betty Jean.

Wednesday, 2/7/73: Bill Scales is summoned to the Sheriff's Crime Lab. Sergeant Ben Lubon administers a polygraph test. Koury, Meyers, and an El Monte PD man observe.

Lubon calls the result conclusive. The subject has no guilty knowledge of his wife's disappearance and possible death.

The Scales job stalled out. No body and no workable crime scene. Koury and Meyers caught fresh murders. The new jobs demanded full-time work. The rain came and went. The pits were full of stagnant water.

3:30 P.M. Sunday, 2/25/73: A perimeter road near a big pit mined by Conrock-Durbin. A five-gallon can on the side of the road.

A security guard stops his car and picks up the can. His dog jumps out of the car and runs into the pit. The guard whistles. The dog barks and ignores the command. The guard walks to the edge of the pit and looks down.

She was nude. She was faceup at the bottom of the pit. The staplebat was fifty-seven inches from her left hand.

She was badly decomposed. Immersion had intensified the decomp. Maggots had eaten her eyes and most of her membranous tissue.

Her skull was caved in. Her hair fell out as she decomped. Maggots swarmed inside the cranial vault.

Matted hair on the business end of the staple-bat.

A dozen cops. .h.i.t the crime scene. They grid-searched the pit. A chopper flew over. A photo deputy shot some wide-angles.

The grid search tapped out. Zero: dirt, rocks, mud, and gravel. A deputy coroner requisitioned the body, He performed a postmortem. His stated cause of death: bluntforce trauma and resultant skull fractures. His s.e.m.e.n smear turned up inconclusive. The v.a.g.i.n.al membranes were waterlogged and badly decomposed.

Everyone knew who she was. They tagged her Jane Doe #10 anyway. They needed a formal ID.

They ID'd her off dental charts: BettyJean Bedford Scales. Born 3/6/49. Probable date of death: 1/29/73.

Koury and Meyers worked the case part-time. They checked recent s.e.x a.s.saults with suspects at large. Their geographic focus: El Monte/Baldwin Park/Irwindale. 12/16/72: 2:00 A.M. The Baldwin Park Post Office. 220 PC--a.s.sault with Intent to Commit Rape.

A white youth accosts a 44-year-old white female. He shoves her into her car at knifepoint. He rips off her bra, pulls down her pants, and fondles her b.u.t.tocks. The victim screams. The suspect flees on foot.

12/17/72:.

3:45 A.M. The all-night laundromat at 4428 Peck, El Monte. 220 PC--a.s.sault with Intent to Commit Rape.

A male Latin accosts a 56-year-old white female. She works at the laundry and another laundry four blocks away.