My Dark Places

by James Ellroy

  Wheelock said he didn’t know Bobbie’s bookie. He didn’t know any “rich guy” or any guy with slicked-back hair or any guy who worked at the Challenge Creamery. Hopkinson thanked him and said he’d be in touch.

  Hallinen, Hopkinson and Lovretovich drove to the Hall of Justice. They checked the bus ticket in Bobbie Long’s purse. Lovretovich called the L.A. Transit Authority. He explained his situation and read off the numbers on the ticket. His contact did some checking and called back. He said the ticket was issued yesterday—1/22/59. It was purchased at 6th and Main in downtown L.A. Their stub was the unused portion. Somebody took an M-line bus to Santa Anita Racetrack and did not take the bus home.

  Hallinen walked down to the morgue. Deputy Coroner Don H. Mills ran the autopsy by him.

  Bobbie Long died of acute asphyxiation. She took some bad shots to the head. Her skull was fractured in four places. One fracture wound was crescent-shaped. The killer might have hit her with a crescent wrench. Her sixth cervical vertebra was fractured and separated. She had partially digested beans, rice and cornmeal in her stomach. She had semen in her vagina. Her external genitalia were not bruised or abraded. Her blood alcohol registered at 0%. She died cold sober.

  A teletype went out that night.

  BROADCAST NO. 76 1/23/59 FILE NO. Z-524-820

  MURDER INFORMATION WANTED EMERGENCY

  FOUND AT APPROX 2:30 AM 1/23/59 VICTIM BOBBIE

  LONG FWA 45-50 5/554, 135 LBS., BLUE EYES, SHORT

  DISHWATER BLOND HAIR. DRESSED IN CHARCOAL AND

  BLACK BLOUSE, BLACK FELT SKIRT, BRIGHT RED FULL

  LENGTH COAT WITH COSTUME JEWELRY HORSE PINNED

  ON LEFT SHOULDER. VICTIM’S PANTIE GIRDLE, BRA,

  AND SLIP WERE ALSO BRIGHT RED. WORE OPEN-TOE

  BLACK SHOES AND CARRIED BLACK PURSE. VICTIM WAS

  FOUND LYING ON BACK BESIDE A DIRT ACCESS ROAD

  NEAR A PUMP HOUSE OFF DON JULIAN ROAD AND 8TH

  AVE., LA PUENTE AREA, FULLY CLOTHED, STRANGLED

  WITH A NYLON STOCKING. HAD ALSO BEEN BEATEN ON

  THE HEAD WITH AN INSTRUMENT LEAVING CRESCENT-SHAPED

  MARKS. HAD HAD INTERCOURSE OR HAD BEEN

  RAPED. ATTENDED RACES AT SANTA ANITA ON 1/22/59.

  PURSE CONTAINED GLASSES AND CAMEL CIGARETTES,

  PLUS USUAL FEMININE EFFECTS. SUSPECT’S CAR MAY

  HAVE BLOODSTAINS. PLEASE CHECK YOUR FIELD

  INTERROGATION CARDS FOR THE AFTERNOON AND

  EVENING UP TO 12:00 MIDNIGHT OF 1/22/59.

  ATTN/TEMPLE STATION

  ATTN/SAN DIMAS STATION

  ATTN/SAN GABRIEL VALLEY POLICE DEPTS.

  ATTN/SAN GABRIEL VALLEY AREA CHP

  REFER MCGOWAN, ANDRE, EVERLEY HQ DB HOMICIDE

  DETAIL

  FILE Z-524-820

  PETER J. PITCHESS, SHERIFF DC SNDG 600 PM

  Ward Hallinen met Harry Andre and Claude Everley at the Bureau. They discussed the Long case 14 hours in. They all thought it resembled the Jean Ellroy job.

  Jean Ellroy was probably raped. Bobbie Long most likely engaged in sex willingly. Her undergarments were properly in place. That fact implied consensual sex.

  Both women sustained head wounds. The body dump locations were six miles apart. Santa Anita was two miles north of Arroyo High School. Both victims were divorcees. The crime scenes looked almost identical. The Ellroy killer dropped the victim’s coat on her legs. The Long killer did the same thing. Bobbie Long was blond. Jean Ellroy was seen with a blond woman. Jean Ellroy ate chili at Stan’s Drive-In. Bobbie Long ate Mexican food. The time lag between homicides was seven months and one day.

  The Ellroy killer used a sash cord and a nylon stocking. The Long killer used a stocking only. Nylon stockings were common strangulation tools. The MO might link the two murders. The MO might not.

  Andre and Everley called every police department in the San Gabriel Valley. They laid out their case. They asked patrol supervisors to check field interrogation cards and traffic reports. Bobbie Long was out with a man last night. They were looking for possible sightings.

  They removed an ID photo from Bobbie Long’s wallet. They canvassed the restaurants and bars near the dump site. They hit some joints along Valley Boulevard. They tried the French Basque, Tina’s Cafe, the Blue Room, the Caves Cafe, Charley’s Cafe and the Silver Dollar Cafe. They came up empty.

  They hit the Canyon Inn. They heard a guy talking up their case way too loud. They braced him. The guy was drunk. He was trying to impress some women.

  Andre and Everley called it quits and went home. Ward Hallinen dropped Bobbie Long’s camera off at the crime lab and told a tech man to develop the film. Ned Lovretovich worked late at the Bureau. He kept calling the names in Bobbie Long’s address book.

  He talked to Edith Boromeo. She said she knew Bobbie 20-some years. They waitressed together in New Orleans. Bobbie was married to a laundry truck driver. He used to beat Bobbie up. She didn’t remember his name. She didn’t know Bobbie’s bookie or any “rich guy” or any guy with slicked-back hair or any guy who worked at the Challenge Creamery.

  He talked to Mabel Brown. She said she used to waitress with Bobbie. Bobbie was very outspoken and rude. She went to the track with Bobbie quite a few times. Bobbie blew all her money on bets and never chipped in for gas. Bobbie accepted rides from strange men all the time. She didn’t know Bobbie’s bookie. She didn’t know any “rich guy.” She didn’t know any guy with slicked-back hair. She didn’t know any guy who worked at the Challenge Creamery.

  He talked to Bill Kimbrough. The guy said he owned a grocery store near Bobbie Long’s apartment. He saw Bobbie at the bus stop yesterday. She was alone. She said she was going to the track.

  Lovretovich drove back to Bobbie Long’s apartment. He tossed it again. He found two liquor bottles stashed below the kitchen sink.

  The Long job was one day old. Everybody thought the same thing.

  Bobbie met some freak at the track. He cooked her some chow at his pad or took her to a restaurant. He fucked her at his pad or fucked her at a motel or raped her at the crime scene and forced her to put her undies back on. They had to canvass Santa Anita. They had to hit all the restaurants and motels in the San Gabriel Valley.

  Andre and Everley drove out to the track. They contacted the concessions boss and showed him their Bobbie Long snapshot. The guy said she looked familiar. He saw a girl like that on Thursday. She was kissing a man with thin blond hair and a big bulbous nose. She was wearing some kind of dark outfit. She wasn’t wearing a coat. There were five checkrooms at the track. Maybe she checked her coat.

  Santa Anita was big and spread out. The concessions guy showed Andre and Everley around. They hit all the checkrooms, bars, betting windows and lunch counters. They flashed Bobbie Long’s picture. A dozen people said she looked familiar.

  Andre called the Bureau. Blackie McGowan said they got an early-morning tip.

  Somebody found a nylon stocking in a suit at Bedon Cleaners in Rosemead. The stocking guy read the morning paper. He knew Bobbie Long got choked. He figured the odd stocking had to be somewhere. He called the Temple City Station. A patrol unit picked up the stocking and rushed it to the Sheriff’s Crime Lab. A technician examined it and compared it to the stocking that choked Bobbie Long. The stockings did not match.

  Andre and Everley drove to the Bureau. They called in their sketch man, Jack Moffett. They told him to draw a picture of Bobbie Long in her snazzy red-and-black ensemble. They told him to draw it in full color and get some glossy prints made up.

  Moffett went to work. Andre called Metro and requested two deputies. The duty sergeant sent Bill Vickers and Frank Godfrey over. They canvassed bars and restaurants on the Jean Ellroy job. Andre told them to blanket the San Gabriel Valley. Hit all the restaurants serving Mexican food and hit all the motels. Look for couples checking in Thursday night. Get their car license numbers and contact the DMV. Get complete registration stats. Contact the registered vehicle owners and find out who they
shacked up with. Motel clerks were required to write down license numbers when their guests checked in. Get that information and follow it up.

  Vickers and Godfrey rolled out. Ward Hallinen rolled out to El Monte. He found Margie Trawick. He showed her a photograph of Elspeth “Bobbie” Long. Margie said no. She wasn’t the woman she saw with Jean Ellroy.

  Claude Everley called the crime lab. He told a technician to photograph Bobbie Long’s clothing and make up some color glossies. The man said he’d developed the film in Bobbie Long’s camera. He got six shots total. They showed Bobbie alone and Bobbie with a few other women. One shot showed a woman and a two-tone ’56 Olds.

  Everley told Andre. Andre said the Ellroy suspect drove a two-tone Olds. Everley called the lab guy back. He told him to route the car photo to the Information Bureau. They could plant it in the L.A. papers. They might ID the car that way.

  Andre liked the car bit. He figured the same guy choked Bobbie and that redheaded nurse.

  Vickers and Godfrey canvassed motels and restaurants. Andre and Everley canvassed the track all weekend. Ned Lovretovich called the people in Bobbie Long’s address book. They all said the same thing.

  Bobbie loved horse racing. Bobbie was frugal. Bobbie disdained all forms of sex. Bobbie was married two to four times. Nobody knew when, where or who to. Nobody knew her bookie. Nobody knew the “rich guy” or the guy with slicked-back hair or the guy who worked at the Challenge Creamery.

  Blackie McGowan assigned four more detectives. He told them to canvass full-time. The San Gabriel Valley was large and full of fuck-pad motels.

  A tip came in on Monday—1/26/59. The tipster ran a hay mill out in La Puente.

  He fingered a truck driver. The guy was shooting his mouth off. He said he screwed a girl at 8th and Don Julian. He said he screwed her goooood. He screwed her early Friday morning.

  The truck driver was Mexican. He lived up in Beaumont.

  Harry Andre called the Beaumont PD and told them to bring the man in. They did it. Andre and Everley drove up to Beaumont and grilled him.

  He said he screwed the girl early Thursday morning. Her name was Sally Ann. He met her at Tina’s Cafe on Simpson and Valley. He went to her pad before he screwed her. It was on 8th Avenue. He saw the name “Vasquez” on the mailbox.

  The man stuck to his story. He said his pal Pete could verify it. Pete lived in La Puente.

  Andre and Everley drove to La Puente. They talked to Pete. They found the house with the “Vasquez” mailbox. They talked to Sally Ann. They cleared the Mexican.

  A tip came in on Tuesday—1/27/59. A man named Jess Dornan snitched off his neighbor Sam Carnes.

  Sam was acting weird lately. Sam was a racetrack fool. Sam defaced his car upholstery two days ago. Maybe he was hacking out some bloodstains.

  Andre questioned Sam Carnes. Sam had an alibi for last Thursday night.

  Vickers and Godfrey canvassed. Andre and Hallinen canvassed. Sergeant Jim Wahlke and Deputy Cal Bublitz canvassed. Sergeant Dick Humphreys and Deputy Bob Grover canvassed. They hit the El Gordo Restaurant, Panchito’s Restaurant, the El Poche Restaurant, the Casa Del Rey Restaurant, Morrow’s Restaurant, the Tic-Toc Restaurant, the County Kitchen, the Utter Hut, Stan’s Drive-in, Rich’s Cafe, the Horseshoe Club, the Lucky X, Belan’s Restaurant, the Spic & Span Motel, the Rose Garden Motel, the End-of-the-Trail Motel, the Fair Motel, the El Portal Motel, the 901 Motel, the Elmwood Motel, the Valley Motel, the Shady Nook Cabins, the 9331 Motel, the Santa Anita Motel, the Flamingo Motel, the Derby Motel, the Bradson Motel, the El Sorrento Motel, the Duarte Motel, the Filly Motel, the Ambassador Motel, the Walnut Auto Court, the Welcome Motel, the Wonderland Motel, the Sunkist Motel, the Bright Spot Motel, the Home Motel, the Sun View Motel, the Mecca Motel, the El Barto Motel, the Scenic Motel, the La Bonita Motel, the Sunlite Motel, the El Monte Motel, the Troy Motel, the El Campo Motel, the Garvey Motel, the Victory Motel, the Rancho Descanso Motel, the Rainbow Motel, the Mountain View Motel, the Walnut Lane Motel, the Covina Motel, the La Siesta Motel, the Stan-Marr Motel and the Hialeah Motel.

  They got hazy information and no information. They checked 130 car registrations. They hit married couples and one-night couples and adulterous couples and prostitute-and-customer couples. They couldn’t locate some people. They ran up a substantial call-and-clear list. They came up dead short on hard suspects.

  A tip came in on Wednesday—1/28/59. A woman named Viola Ramsey snitched off her husband.

  His name was James Orville Ramsey. He abandoned Mrs. Ramsey last month. He called her Monday night. He said, “If you want to put me on the goddamn spot, your ass is going to lay next to that waitress in the Puente Hills. If your friends miss you for three or four days, tell them they will find your ass laying in the sand next to hers.”

  James Orville Ramsey was 33 years old. He was a fry cook. Mrs. Ramsey said he hated waitresses. He thought they were cheap and no good. He liked horse racing and Mexican food. He was a drunk. He served time for burglary and GTA. He liked older women. He threatened to kill Mrs. Ramsey and “spit in her blood.” He drove a ’54 Chevy two-door. His last known place of employment was the Five Points Bowling Alley in El Monte. He was shacked up with a 19-year-old girl named Joan Baker. She waitressed at Happy’s Cafe. Mrs. Ramsey waitressed at Jack’s Bar in Monterey Park.

  Claude Everley questioned James Orville Ramsey. The tip was vindictive bullshit.

  The LA papers ran the car photo on Thursday—1/29/59. They ran a sidebar piece requesting information and listed the Sheriff’s Homicide phone number. The Long case was six days old. It was going absolutely nowhere.

  Andre and Everley canvassed the track again. A coffee-counter girl said she saw Bobbie Long last week. She pushed to the front of her line. She was quite rude.

  Another coffee girl told the same story. Bobbie pushed to the front of her line. She was rude. She refused to wait in line like everybody else.

  A cashier said he saw Bobbie last week. She cashed a ticket at his window. She “acted rummy.”

  A security guard said he saw Bobbie last Thursday. She was alone.

  A bartender said he served Bobbie last week. She was “half drunk.”

  A bus driver said he saw a woman resembling Bobbie Long last week. She got into a ’53 Ford with two male Negroes. The car was powder blue. The passenger door squeaked.

  The lab guys did some good work. They hung Bobbie Long’s coat, blouse and skirt on pegs and shot them in full color. Ward Hallinen picked up two dozen prints and drove out to the San Gabriel Valley. He left copies at the Temple City Sheriff’s Station, the San Dimas Sheriff’s Station and the Baldwin Park, Arcadia and El Monte PDs. He talked to five detective squad lieutenants. He asked them to run separate canvasses within their jurisdictions. They said they’d try to squeeze the work in.

  Ethlyn Manlove came into the Bureau Thursday afternoon. Ray Hopkinson interviewed her. A stenographer transcribed her statement.

  She said Bobbie Long lied about her age. She said Bobbie was married twice. Bobbie married a guy in New Orleans and a guy in Abilene, Kansas. She didn’t know their names. Bobbie had two brothers and a sister. She didn’t know their names. She said Bobbie had no need for love or sex. Bobbie loved money. Bobbie was “very mercenary.”

  Hopkinson asked Miss Manlove if Bobbie would trade sex for money. She said she would. She said a sea captain “kept” Bobbie during World War II. He paid for her clothes and apartment. He sent her $250 a month.

  Miss Manlove said Bobbie would demand good money. She’d want $25 or $50 a throw. Maybe she put out for some guy. Maybe he stiffed her. Bobbie threw a fit. The guy killed her to shut her up and keep his money.

  Hopkinson said it was possible.

  A woman called Sheriff’s Homicide on Friday—1/30/59. She identified herself as Mrs. K. E Lawter and said she saw the picture in the papers. The woman was her former tenant Gertrude Hoven. Gertrude used to live in a building she owned.

  Ward Hallinen called Mrs. Lawter. She
said Gertrude Hoven lived in San Francisco now. The picture was taken outside her building in the Crenshaw District. The Oldsmobile belonged to Mrs. Henry S. Nevala. She still lived in the building.

  Hallinen called Mrs. Nevala. She said she remembered the incident. Bobbie Long took the picture. It was cheeky behavior. Bobbie should have asked permission first.

  They discussed Bobbie Long. Mrs. Nevala said Bobbie used to bet with a bookie named Eddie Vince. Eddie worked out of a restaurant at 54th and Crenshaw. He died in a car wreck last year. Another guy took over his business.

  The Long case was one week old. It was all loose ends and misinformation.

  They cleared all the motel guys. They checked reports on choke murders going back five years and came up empty. They hauled in some of the sex fiends from the Ellroy case and leaned on them again. They leaned on 22 brand-new registered sex offenders. They came up dead empty.

  Other murders occurred. The Bobbie Long crew dispersed. They worked fresh cases and snagged occasional Bobbie Long tips.

  They got a tip and identified the Challenge Creamery guy. His name was Tom Moore. He was working at the Challenge Creamery the night Bobbie got choked.

  They got a tip on 2/14/59. Two East L.A. deputies popped a clown named Walter Eldon Bosch. He was holed up in a motel room. He was jacking off and making dirty phone calls. They checked him out and cleared him as a suspect.

  They got a tip on 2/17/59. Norwalk Patrol popped a guy named Eugene Thomas Friese. Two deputies caught him dragging a woman into an alley. He had a rape jacket dating back to 1951. He took a polygraph test on the Bobbie Long case. The examiner called the result “inconclusive.”

  They got a tip on 3/29/59. The Temple City squad called it in. A woman named Evelyn Louise Haggin said a man named William Clifford Epperly kidnapped her, raped her and performed sex perversions on her. Harry Andre interviewed Evelyn Louise Haggin. She said Epperly choked her unconscious. Her neck was unmarked. She said she had sex with Epperly two or three times before he raped her. Andre talked to Epperly. Epperly said he just served a year county time. He was in custody from 2/20/58 to 2/8/59. Andre confirmed the dates and cleared Epperly.