Saturday, April 27, 2013
Friday, April 26, 2013
Illinois police agency investigating Farrakhan son
Illinois police agency investigating Farrakhan son:
April 25, 2013
Associated Press
A state law enforcement agency is investigating the son of Nation of Islam Minister Louis Farrakhan after a newspaper determined he is a part-time suburban police officer who uses an unmarked squad car to provide traffic control for his father, an official said this week.
The (Chicago) Sun-Times also reported that Mustapha Farrakhan hasn't worked a shift for the department in more than four years.
"We opened a preliminary investigation after the Sun-Times told us about their investigation," said Kevin McClain, the executive director of the Illinois Police Standards and Training Board.
McClain said he ordered the investigation last week after a reporter contacted his office about what would become a front-page story.
Harvey Police Chief Denard Eaves described Farrakhan as a "volunteer" police officer, but declined to provide the newspaper any details, saying only in a statement that he "stands behind" Farrakhan's appointment and that "Officer Farrakhan assists the Police Department with community relations."
Eaves did not immediately return a call from The Associated Press. Farrakhan does not have a listed number and the Nation of Islam did not immediately return a call for comment from the AP.
The Sun-Times reported that the 52-year-old Farrakhan "certainly has a police badge" from Harvey, a suburb located just south of Chicago, and since 2006 has been registered as a "gun-carrying Harvey cop."
But the paper also found that Farrakhan lives in Crete, about 12 miles from Harvey.
And while state records show he has not worked for the department in four years, the newspaper found YouTube videos that show he has used the lights of his unmarked squad car to stop traffic and escort his father's "unofficial motorcade."
John Millner, the chief of police in Elmhurst and head of the Illinois Police Chief's Association, said that state law allows officers to use their police powers outside their jurisdiction but typically do so only in an emergency, or at the request of the department whose jurisdiction they are in.
McClain would not discuss the Sun-Times story or whether Farrakhan's actions as described by the paper might have been illegal.
Even before Farrakhan stopped logging hours as a sworn police officer more than four years ago, he worked very little, the newspaper said. According to Harvey police records filed with the state, he worked just nine hours in the first half of 2007, 14 in the second half, and 118 1/2 hours in the second half of 2008. After that, the newspaper reported, he stopped working for the department altogether.
Information from: Chicago Sun-Times, http://www.suntimes.com/index
April 25, 2013Associated Press
A state law enforcement agency is investigating the son of Nation of Islam Minister Louis Farrakhan after a newspaper determined he is a part-time suburban police officer who uses an unmarked squad car to provide traffic control for his father, an official said this week.
The (Chicago) Sun-Times also reported that Mustapha Farrakhan hasn't worked a shift for the department in more than four years.
"We opened a preliminary investigation after the Sun-Times told us about their investigation," said Kevin McClain, the executive director of the Illinois Police Standards and Training Board.
McClain said he ordered the investigation last week after a reporter contacted his office about what would become a front-page story.
Harvey Police Chief Denard Eaves described Farrakhan as a "volunteer" police officer, but declined to provide the newspaper any details, saying only in a statement that he "stands behind" Farrakhan's appointment and that "Officer Farrakhan assists the Police Department with community relations."
Eaves did not immediately return a call from The Associated Press. Farrakhan does not have a listed number and the Nation of Islam did not immediately return a call for comment from the AP.
The Sun-Times reported that the 52-year-old Farrakhan "certainly has a police badge" from Harvey, a suburb located just south of Chicago, and since 2006 has been registered as a "gun-carrying Harvey cop."
But the paper also found that Farrakhan lives in Crete, about 12 miles from Harvey.
And while state records show he has not worked for the department in four years, the newspaper found YouTube videos that show he has used the lights of his unmarked squad car to stop traffic and escort his father's "unofficial motorcade."
John Millner, the chief of police in Elmhurst and head of the Illinois Police Chief's Association, said that state law allows officers to use their police powers outside their jurisdiction but typically do so only in an emergency, or at the request of the department whose jurisdiction they are in.
McClain would not discuss the Sun-Times story or whether Farrakhan's actions as described by the paper might have been illegal.
Even before Farrakhan stopped logging hours as a sworn police officer more than four years ago, he worked very little, the newspaper said. According to Harvey police records filed with the state, he worked just nine hours in the first half of 2007, 14 in the second half, and 118 1/2 hours in the second half of 2008. After that, the newspaper reported, he stopped working for the department altogether.
Information from: Chicago Sun-Times, http://www.suntimes.com/index
Los Angeles settles with women fired on in manhunt
Los Angeles settles with women fired on in manhunt:
April 25, 2013
By TAMI ABDOLLAH
Associated Press
The city of Los Angeles reached a $4.2 million settlement with two women who were injured when police mistakenly opened fire on them during the manhunt for disgruntled ex-cop Christopher Dorner, an official said Tuesday.
City Attorney Carmen Trutanich announced the sum to KNBC-TV Los Angeles, and an attorney representing the women confirmed the amount to The Associated Press.
The settlement must still be approved by the Los Angeles City Council.
Margie Carranza and her 71-year-old mother, Emma Hernandez, were delivering papers around 5 a.m. on Feb. 7 when LAPD officers guarding the Torrance home of a target named in an online Dorner manifesto blasted at least 100 rounds at their pickup.
Hernandez was shot in the back and Carranza had minor injuries.
The settlement means they cannot pursue any future injury claims against the city.
Dorner had vowed warfare on Los Angeles Police Department officers and their families for what he called an unfair firing.
He killed four people, including two law enforcement officers, during his nearly one-week run from authorities.
Attorney Glen Jonas, who represents the women, called the settlement amount fair and said it spared the city from defending a case that involved eight police officers and would have likely cost millions of dollars.
“The only certainty was the litigation was going to cost everyone a lot of money and a lot of time,” Jonas said.
Jonas sent a nine-page demand to the city more than a month ago that provided an opening to negotiations. He said he negotiated with Trutanich for weeks before the deal was reached on Monday night.
“We’re two veteran trial lawyers trying to settle a case, and we both understand the reality of litigation and what it costs to both sides,” Jonas said.
The women agreed to receive the payment after June 30 — the end of the fiscal year — to help the city with its budgeting. The agreement came in addition to a separate $40,000 settlement reached earlier for the loss of the women’s pickup truck.
“For them, the money is not the issue as much as (the city) just doing the right thing,” Jonas said. “Everyone agreed that they were wronged, but we didn’t know whether responsibility would be assumed ... It’s pleasant to get that done without having to go through years of litigation.”
The eight officers remain assigned to non-field duties pending an internal investigation.
April 25, 2013By TAMI ABDOLLAH
Associated Press
The city of Los Angeles reached a $4.2 million settlement with two women who were injured when police mistakenly opened fire on them during the manhunt for disgruntled ex-cop Christopher Dorner, an official said Tuesday.
City Attorney Carmen Trutanich announced the sum to KNBC-TV Los Angeles, and an attorney representing the women confirmed the amount to The Associated Press.
The settlement must still be approved by the Los Angeles City Council.
Margie Carranza and her 71-year-old mother, Emma Hernandez, were delivering papers around 5 a.m. on Feb. 7 when LAPD officers guarding the Torrance home of a target named in an online Dorner manifesto blasted at least 100 rounds at their pickup.
Hernandez was shot in the back and Carranza had minor injuries.
The settlement means they cannot pursue any future injury claims against the city.
Dorner had vowed warfare on Los Angeles Police Department officers and their families for what he called an unfair firing.
He killed four people, including two law enforcement officers, during his nearly one-week run from authorities.
Attorney Glen Jonas, who represents the women, called the settlement amount fair and said it spared the city from defending a case that involved eight police officers and would have likely cost millions of dollars.
“The only certainty was the litigation was going to cost everyone a lot of money and a lot of time,” Jonas said.
Jonas sent a nine-page demand to the city more than a month ago that provided an opening to negotiations. He said he negotiated with Trutanich for weeks before the deal was reached on Monday night.
“We’re two veteran trial lawyers trying to settle a case, and we both understand the reality of litigation and what it costs to both sides,” Jonas said.
The women agreed to receive the payment after June 30 — the end of the fiscal year — to help the city with its budgeting. The agreement came in addition to a separate $40,000 settlement reached earlier for the loss of the women’s pickup truck.
“For them, the money is not the issue as much as (the city) just doing the right thing,” Jonas said. “Everyone agreed that they were wronged, but we didn’t know whether responsibility would be assumed ... It’s pleasant to get that done without having to go through years of litigation.”
The eight officers remain assigned to non-field duties pending an internal investigation.
Wednesday, April 24, 2013
Metro Driver Accused of On-The-Job Sexual Assault
Metro Driver Accused of On-The-Job Sexual Assault:
LANHAM, Md. (CBSDC) — A 50-year-old MetroAccess driver was arrested by D.C.’s Metro Transit Police Wednesday, and charged with first-degree sexual assault.
MetroAccess is a door-to-door paratransit service for people with disabilities that prevent them from using standard bus or rail service.
Police say Ezra Porter, of Upper Marlboro, Maryland, stopped his vehicle and had inappropriate sexual contact with the adult female he was transporting on April 19. Transit Police were contacted that afternoon by a family member and immediately launched an investigation. Porter has not provided MetroAccess service since the alleged incident.
Porter is employed by MV Transportation, a company contracted by MetroAccess. Metro requires MV Transportation to screen all employees who provide MetroAccess service for criminal history prior to employment, according to police. Porter has been employed by the company since November 2009.
Follow WNEW on Twitter.
LANHAM, Md. (CBSDC) — A 50-year-old MetroAccess driver was arrested by D.C.’s Metro Transit Police Wednesday, and charged with first-degree sexual assault.
MetroAccess is a door-to-door paratransit service for people with disabilities that prevent them from using standard bus or rail service.
Police say Ezra Porter, of Upper Marlboro, Maryland, stopped his vehicle and had inappropriate sexual contact with the adult female he was transporting on April 19. Transit Police were contacted that afternoon by a family member and immediately launched an investigation. Porter has not provided MetroAccess service since the alleged incident.
Porter is employed by MV Transportation, a company contracted by MetroAccess. Metro requires MV Transportation to screen all employees who provide MetroAccess service for criminal history prior to employment, according to police. Porter has been employed by the company since November 2009.
Follow WNEW on Twitter.
Man Fatally Shot on Sidewalk
Man Fatally Shot on Sidewalk:
(LOS ANGELES) -- A man was shot and killed while walking on the sidewalk on Wednesday, and Los Angeles Police Department West Bureau Homicide detectives are asking for the public’s help in finding the suspect.
Police say the victim, 31-year-old Kallen Mahone was walking on S. Gramercy Drive around 1:15 a.m. when an unknown suspect approached and shot him numerous times. Mahone, who had moved to Los Angeles less than a year ago, collapsed on the sidewalk.
Los Angeles Fire Department paramedics arrived and transported Mahone to a local hospital, but he died due to his injuries.
There is very little known about the suspect, and officials have no known motive for the crime at this time.
Police are asking anyone with information that may lead to the arrest of Mahone’s killer to contact West Bureau Homicide Detectives at (213)382-9470. Anyone wishing to remain anonymous can call Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-TIPS (800-222-8477).
Copyright 2013 ABC News Radio
(LOS ANGELES) -- A man was shot and killed while walking on the sidewalk on Wednesday, and Los Angeles Police Department West Bureau Homicide detectives are asking for the public’s help in finding the suspect.Police say the victim, 31-year-old Kallen Mahone was walking on S. Gramercy Drive around 1:15 a.m. when an unknown suspect approached and shot him numerous times. Mahone, who had moved to Los Angeles less than a year ago, collapsed on the sidewalk.
Los Angeles Fire Department paramedics arrived and transported Mahone to a local hospital, but he died due to his injuries.
There is very little known about the suspect, and officials have no known motive for the crime at this time.
Police are asking anyone with information that may lead to the arrest of Mahone’s killer to contact West Bureau Homicide Detectives at (213)382-9470. Anyone wishing to remain anonymous can call Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-TIPS (800-222-8477).
Copyright 2013 ABC News Radio
Tuesday, April 23, 2013
2 NC Democratic strategists stabbed in their home
2 NC Democratic strategists stabbed in their home: Two North Carolina Democratic political strategists who have worked for high-profile candidates were seriously wounded after being stabbed in their Raleigh home, and a suspect has been charged.
Cold case arrest prompts cross-country probe
Cold case arrest prompts cross-country probe:
April 11, 2013
By TAMI ABDOLLAH Associated Press
When Los Angeles cold case detectives caught up with Samuel Little this past fall, he was living in a Christian shelter in Kentucky, his latest arrest a few months earlier for alleged possession of a crack pipe. But the LA investigators wanted him on far more serious charges: The slayings of two women in 1989, both found strangled and nude below the waist — victims of what police concluded had been sexually motivated strangulations.
Little's name came up, police said, after DNA evidence collected at old crime scenes matched samples of his stored in a criminal database. After detectives say they found yet another match, a third murder charge was soon added against Little.
Now, as the 72-year-old former boxer and transient awaits trial in Los Angeles, authorities in numerous jurisdictions in California, Florida, Kentucky, Missouri, Louisiana, Texas, Georgia, Mississippi and Ohio are scouring their own cold case files for possible ties to Little. One old murder case, in Pascagoula, Miss., already has been reopened. DNA results are pending in some others.
Little's more than 100-page rap sheet details crimes in 24 states spread over 56 years — mostly assault, burglary, armed robbery, shoplifting and drug violations. In that time, authorities say incredulously, he served less than 10 years in prison.
But Los Angeles detectives allege he was also a serial killer, who traveled the country preying on prostitutes, drug addicts and troubled women.
They assert Little often delivered a knockout punch to women and then proceeded to strangle them while masturbating, dumping the bodies and soon after leaving town. Their investigation has turned up a number of cases in which he was a suspect or convicted.
Police are using those old cases — and tracking down surviving victims — to help build their own against Little.
"We see a pattern, and the pattern matches what he's got away with in the past," said LAPD Detective Mitzi Roberts.
Little has pleaded not guilty in the three LA slayings, and in interviews with detectives after his September arrest he described his police record as "dismissed, not guilty, dismissed."
"I just be in the wrong place at the wrong time with people," he said, according to an interview transcript reviewed by The Associated Press.
Still, as more details emerge, so do more questions. Among them: How did someone with so many encounters with the law, suspected by prosecutors and police officers of killing for decades, manage to escape serious jail time?
"It's the craziest rap sheet I've ever seen," said Los Angeles Deputy District Attorney Beth Silverman, who has worked many serial killer cold cases. "The fact that he hasn't spent a more significant period of his life (in custody) is a shocking thing. He's gotten break after break after break."
Deputy Public Defender Michael Pentz, who represents Little, declined to comment.
Authorities have pieced together a 24-page timeline tracking Little's activity across the country since his birth. His rap sheet has helped them pinpoint his location sometimes on a monthly basis. Law enforcement agencies are now cross-referencing that timeline with cold case slayings in their states.
The Florida Department of Law Enforcement is leading a review of that state's unsolved murders and helping coordinate the effort among 12 jurisdictions. The department published an intelligence bulletin alerting authorities in Florida, Alabama and Georgia about Little's case, noting he lived in the area on and off in the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s.
"We strongly encouraged them to look at any unresolved homicides that they had during those time frames and then consider him as a potential suspect," said Jeff Fortier, a special agent supervisor at the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. The department is re-examining DNA evidence in about 15 cases that was collected before advances in forensic science allowed for thorough analysis, Fortier said.
"We are in the infancy stages of what we expect will be a protracted investigation," he said.
In Mississippi, Pascagoula cold case Detective Darren Versiga is re-investigating the killing of Melinda LaPree, a 22-year-old prostitute found strangled in 1982. Little had been arrested in that crime but never indicted, Versiga said. The detective has tracked down old witnesses and is working to reconstruct the case file because much of it was washed away during Hurricane Katrina.
Little, who often went by the name Samuel McDowell, grew up with his grandmother in Lorain, Ohio. His rap sheet shows his first arrest at age 16 on burglary charges. After serving time in a youth authority he was released and, months later, arrested again for breaking and entering.
In an hour- and 15-minute interview with Los Angeles detectives, Little spoke openly about his past and his time in the penitentiary, where he started boxing as a middleweight against the other inmates. "I used to be a prizefighter," he said.
In his late 20s, Little went to live with his mother in Florida and worked at the Dade County Department of Sanitation and, later, at a cemetery. Soon, he began traveling more widely and had more run-ins with the law; between 1971 and 1974 Little was arrested in eight states for crimes that included armed robbery, rape, theft, solicitation of a prostitute, shoplifting, DUI, aggravated assault on a police officer and fraud.
"I've been in and out of the penitentiary," he told the California officers.
"Well, for what?" a detective asked, to which Little responded: "Shoplifting and, uh, petty thefts and stuff."
Then came the 911 call of Sept. 11, 1976, in Sunset Hills, Mo.
Pamela Kay Smith was banging on the back door of a home, crying for help, naked below the waist with her hands bound behind her back with electrical cord and cloth. Smith, who was a drug addict, told officers that she was picked up by Little in St. Louis. She said he choked her from behind with electrical cord, forced her into his car, beat her unconscious, then drove to Sunset Hills and raped her.
Officers found Little, then 36, still seated in his car near the home where Smith sought refuge, with her jewelry and clothing inside. Little denied raping Smith, telling officers: "I only beat her." The case summary was recalled in court papers filed by prosecutors in Los Angeles.
Little was found guilty of assault with the intent to ravish-rape and was sentenced to three months in county jail. Pascagoula Detective Versiga, who reviewed the Smith case, believes Little may have pleaded to a lesser charge and received a shorter sentence because of the victim's lifestyle. The case file refers to Smith as a heroin addict who often failed to appear in court.
After that, the charges against Little grew more serious.
In Pascagoula, LaPree went missing in September 1982 after getting into a wood-paneled station wagon with a man witnesses later identified as Little. A month later her remains were found, and Little was arrested in her killing and the assault of two other prostitutes. Versiga believes grand jurors failed to indict in part because of the difficulty in determining a precise time of death but also because of credibility problems due to the victim and witnesses working as prostitutes.
Little, nevertheless, remained in custody and was extradited to Florida to be tried in the case of another slain woman.
Patricia Ann Mount, 26 and mentally disabled, was found dead in the fall of 1982 in rural Forest Grove, Fla., near Gainesville. Eyewitnesses described last seeing her leaving a beer tavern with a man identified as Little in a wood-paneled station wagon.
According to The Gainesville Sun's coverage of the trial, a fiber analyst testified that hairs found on Mount's clothes "had the same characteristics as head hairs taken from" Little. But when cross-examined the analyst said "it was also possible for hairs to be transferred if two people bumped together."
A jury acquitted Little in January 1984.
By October 1984, Little was back in custody — this time in San Diego, accused in the attempted murder of two prostitutes who were kidnapped a month apart, driven to the same abandoned dirt lot, assaulted and choked. The first woman was left unconscious on a pile of trash but survived, according to court records. Patrol officers discovered Little in a car with the second woman and arrested him.
The two cases were tried jointly, but the jury failed to reach a verdict. Little later pleaded guilty to lesser charges of assault with great bodily injury and false imprisonment. He served about 2.5 years on a four-year sentence and, in February 1987, he was released on parole.
As he told the LA detectives in his interview, Little then moved to Los Angeles, where three more women were soon discovered dead: Carol Alford, 41, found on July 13, 1987; Audrey Nelson, 35, found on Aug. 14, 1989; and Guadalupe Apodaca, 46, found on Sept. 3, 1989. All were manually strangled.
It is for those slayings that Little now stands charged. No trial date has been set, though Little is due back in court this month for a procedural hearing. If convicted, Little would face a minimum of life in prison without parole, though prosecutors said they may seek the death penalty.
When the case landed on Detective Roberts' desk, she had no idea it would grow from two local cold case slayings to a cross-country probe into the past of a man with some 75 arrests. As she studied her suspect, Roberts also began calling agencies that had dealt with Little most recently.
He had been arrested on May 1, 2012, by sheriff's deputies in Lake Charles, La., for possession of a crack pipe and released with an upcoming court date. At Roberts' request, deputies tried finding him but came up empty. Then last September deputies called with a hit tracing an ATM purchase by Little to a Louisville, Ky., minimart. Within hours he was found at a nearby shelter.
In his interview with police, Little said he didn't recognize the slain LA women. Detectives said that DNA collected from semen on upper body clothing or from fingernail scrapings connect him to the crimes.
Roberts and others who've investigated Little through the years said some cases may not have gone forward because DNA testing wasn't available until the mid-1980s and, even when it was, wouldn't have been useful in these cases unless authorities tested clothing, fingernails or body swabs. Due to this perpetrator's particular modus operandi, DNA wouldn't necessarily be found through standard rape kit collection.
Even in those cases that did go to trial, they said, jurors may have found the victims less credible because of their backgrounds, and the witnesses — often prostitutes — in some cases disappeared. Because Little was also a transient, Roberts said: "I don't think he stuck in a lot of peoples' minds much."
"But what's different now, we're just not going to allow that to happen," she said. "I think we owe it to the victims. I think we owe it to the families."
Tony Zambrano was 17 when he learned his mother, Guadalupe Apodaca, was killed after going out for a drink one night.
"My brother told me she left, she went to go have a couple beers, and never came home," he recalls. Soon after he learned of her slaying.
For years Zambrano tried to find out what happened to his mother. When Roberts called him following Little's arrest, he was grateful. But he's also upset.
"My mom shouldn't really be dead now. For all those charges in San Diego, who gets four years?" Zambrano said. "This thing ain't over for a long shot."
April 11, 2013By TAMI ABDOLLAH Associated Press
When Los Angeles cold case detectives caught up with Samuel Little this past fall, he was living in a Christian shelter in Kentucky, his latest arrest a few months earlier for alleged possession of a crack pipe. But the LA investigators wanted him on far more serious charges: The slayings of two women in 1989, both found strangled and nude below the waist — victims of what police concluded had been sexually motivated strangulations.
Little's name came up, police said, after DNA evidence collected at old crime scenes matched samples of his stored in a criminal database. After detectives say they found yet another match, a third murder charge was soon added against Little.
Now, as the 72-year-old former boxer and transient awaits trial in Los Angeles, authorities in numerous jurisdictions in California, Florida, Kentucky, Missouri, Louisiana, Texas, Georgia, Mississippi and Ohio are scouring their own cold case files for possible ties to Little. One old murder case, in Pascagoula, Miss., already has been reopened. DNA results are pending in some others.
Little's more than 100-page rap sheet details crimes in 24 states spread over 56 years — mostly assault, burglary, armed robbery, shoplifting and drug violations. In that time, authorities say incredulously, he served less than 10 years in prison.
But Los Angeles detectives allege he was also a serial killer, who traveled the country preying on prostitutes, drug addicts and troubled women.
They assert Little often delivered a knockout punch to women and then proceeded to strangle them while masturbating, dumping the bodies and soon after leaving town. Their investigation has turned up a number of cases in which he was a suspect or convicted.
Police are using those old cases — and tracking down surviving victims — to help build their own against Little.
"We see a pattern, and the pattern matches what he's got away with in the past," said LAPD Detective Mitzi Roberts.
Little has pleaded not guilty in the three LA slayings, and in interviews with detectives after his September arrest he described his police record as "dismissed, not guilty, dismissed."
"I just be in the wrong place at the wrong time with people," he said, according to an interview transcript reviewed by The Associated Press.
Still, as more details emerge, so do more questions. Among them: How did someone with so many encounters with the law, suspected by prosecutors and police officers of killing for decades, manage to escape serious jail time?
"It's the craziest rap sheet I've ever seen," said Los Angeles Deputy District Attorney Beth Silverman, who has worked many serial killer cold cases. "The fact that he hasn't spent a more significant period of his life (in custody) is a shocking thing. He's gotten break after break after break."
Deputy Public Defender Michael Pentz, who represents Little, declined to comment.
Authorities have pieced together a 24-page timeline tracking Little's activity across the country since his birth. His rap sheet has helped them pinpoint his location sometimes on a monthly basis. Law enforcement agencies are now cross-referencing that timeline with cold case slayings in their states.
The Florida Department of Law Enforcement is leading a review of that state's unsolved murders and helping coordinate the effort among 12 jurisdictions. The department published an intelligence bulletin alerting authorities in Florida, Alabama and Georgia about Little's case, noting he lived in the area on and off in the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s.
"We strongly encouraged them to look at any unresolved homicides that they had during those time frames and then consider him as a potential suspect," said Jeff Fortier, a special agent supervisor at the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. The department is re-examining DNA evidence in about 15 cases that was collected before advances in forensic science allowed for thorough analysis, Fortier said.
"We are in the infancy stages of what we expect will be a protracted investigation," he said.
In Mississippi, Pascagoula cold case Detective Darren Versiga is re-investigating the killing of Melinda LaPree, a 22-year-old prostitute found strangled in 1982. Little had been arrested in that crime but never indicted, Versiga said. The detective has tracked down old witnesses and is working to reconstruct the case file because much of it was washed away during Hurricane Katrina.
Little, who often went by the name Samuel McDowell, grew up with his grandmother in Lorain, Ohio. His rap sheet shows his first arrest at age 16 on burglary charges. After serving time in a youth authority he was released and, months later, arrested again for breaking and entering.
In an hour- and 15-minute interview with Los Angeles detectives, Little spoke openly about his past and his time in the penitentiary, where he started boxing as a middleweight against the other inmates. "I used to be a prizefighter," he said.
In his late 20s, Little went to live with his mother in Florida and worked at the Dade County Department of Sanitation and, later, at a cemetery. Soon, he began traveling more widely and had more run-ins with the law; between 1971 and 1974 Little was arrested in eight states for crimes that included armed robbery, rape, theft, solicitation of a prostitute, shoplifting, DUI, aggravated assault on a police officer and fraud.
"I've been in and out of the penitentiary," he told the California officers.
"Well, for what?" a detective asked, to which Little responded: "Shoplifting and, uh, petty thefts and stuff."
Then came the 911 call of Sept. 11, 1976, in Sunset Hills, Mo.
Pamela Kay Smith was banging on the back door of a home, crying for help, naked below the waist with her hands bound behind her back with electrical cord and cloth. Smith, who was a drug addict, told officers that she was picked up by Little in St. Louis. She said he choked her from behind with electrical cord, forced her into his car, beat her unconscious, then drove to Sunset Hills and raped her.
Officers found Little, then 36, still seated in his car near the home where Smith sought refuge, with her jewelry and clothing inside. Little denied raping Smith, telling officers: "I only beat her." The case summary was recalled in court papers filed by prosecutors in Los Angeles.
Little was found guilty of assault with the intent to ravish-rape and was sentenced to three months in county jail. Pascagoula Detective Versiga, who reviewed the Smith case, believes Little may have pleaded to a lesser charge and received a shorter sentence because of the victim's lifestyle. The case file refers to Smith as a heroin addict who often failed to appear in court.
After that, the charges against Little grew more serious.
In Pascagoula, LaPree went missing in September 1982 after getting into a wood-paneled station wagon with a man witnesses later identified as Little. A month later her remains were found, and Little was arrested in her killing and the assault of two other prostitutes. Versiga believes grand jurors failed to indict in part because of the difficulty in determining a precise time of death but also because of credibility problems due to the victim and witnesses working as prostitutes.
Little, nevertheless, remained in custody and was extradited to Florida to be tried in the case of another slain woman.
Patricia Ann Mount, 26 and mentally disabled, was found dead in the fall of 1982 in rural Forest Grove, Fla., near Gainesville. Eyewitnesses described last seeing her leaving a beer tavern with a man identified as Little in a wood-paneled station wagon.
According to The Gainesville Sun's coverage of the trial, a fiber analyst testified that hairs found on Mount's clothes "had the same characteristics as head hairs taken from" Little. But when cross-examined the analyst said "it was also possible for hairs to be transferred if two people bumped together."
A jury acquitted Little in January 1984.
By October 1984, Little was back in custody — this time in San Diego, accused in the attempted murder of two prostitutes who were kidnapped a month apart, driven to the same abandoned dirt lot, assaulted and choked. The first woman was left unconscious on a pile of trash but survived, according to court records. Patrol officers discovered Little in a car with the second woman and arrested him.
The two cases were tried jointly, but the jury failed to reach a verdict. Little later pleaded guilty to lesser charges of assault with great bodily injury and false imprisonment. He served about 2.5 years on a four-year sentence and, in February 1987, he was released on parole.
As he told the LA detectives in his interview, Little then moved to Los Angeles, where three more women were soon discovered dead: Carol Alford, 41, found on July 13, 1987; Audrey Nelson, 35, found on Aug. 14, 1989; and Guadalupe Apodaca, 46, found on Sept. 3, 1989. All were manually strangled.
It is for those slayings that Little now stands charged. No trial date has been set, though Little is due back in court this month for a procedural hearing. If convicted, Little would face a minimum of life in prison without parole, though prosecutors said they may seek the death penalty.
When the case landed on Detective Roberts' desk, she had no idea it would grow from two local cold case slayings to a cross-country probe into the past of a man with some 75 arrests. As she studied her suspect, Roberts also began calling agencies that had dealt with Little most recently.
He had been arrested on May 1, 2012, by sheriff's deputies in Lake Charles, La., for possession of a crack pipe and released with an upcoming court date. At Roberts' request, deputies tried finding him but came up empty. Then last September deputies called with a hit tracing an ATM purchase by Little to a Louisville, Ky., minimart. Within hours he was found at a nearby shelter.
In his interview with police, Little said he didn't recognize the slain LA women. Detectives said that DNA collected from semen on upper body clothing or from fingernail scrapings connect him to the crimes.
Roberts and others who've investigated Little through the years said some cases may not have gone forward because DNA testing wasn't available until the mid-1980s and, even when it was, wouldn't have been useful in these cases unless authorities tested clothing, fingernails or body swabs. Due to this perpetrator's particular modus operandi, DNA wouldn't necessarily be found through standard rape kit collection.
Even in those cases that did go to trial, they said, jurors may have found the victims less credible because of their backgrounds, and the witnesses — often prostitutes — in some cases disappeared. Because Little was also a transient, Roberts said: "I don't think he stuck in a lot of peoples' minds much."
"But what's different now, we're just not going to allow that to happen," she said. "I think we owe it to the victims. I think we owe it to the families."
Tony Zambrano was 17 when he learned his mother, Guadalupe Apodaca, was killed after going out for a drink one night.
"My brother told me she left, she went to go have a couple beers, and never came home," he recalls. Soon after he learned of her slaying.
For years Zambrano tried to find out what happened to his mother. When Roberts called him following Little's arrest, he was grateful. But he's also upset.
"My mom shouldn't really be dead now. For all those charges in San Diego, who gets four years?" Zambrano said. "This thing ain't over for a long shot."
Man Accused in Las Vegas Strip Deaths is Extradited From Los Angeles
Man Accused in Las Vegas Strip Deaths is Extradited From Los Angeles:
April 18, 2013
City News Service
A man charged with murder and other counts in a shooting and fiery crash on the Las Vegas Strip nearly two months ago has been extradited from Los Angeles to Nevada. Ammar Harris, 27, was released just after 11:30 p.m. Monday to Nevada law enforcement officials, according to jail records. Harris was returned to Clark County, Nev., where he was awaiting a court appearance on Wednesday, according to Tess Driver of the Clark County District Attorney's Office.
He had been jailed in Los Angeles since his arrest at a Studio City apartment complex on February 28. After examining photographs and fingerprints, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Shelly Torrealba said she determined last month that Harris is ``the same individual'' being sought by the state of Nevada. Authorities allege that Harris opened fire Feb. 21 from a Range Rover on Oakland-based rap artist Kenny Clutch, legally known as Kenneth Wayne Cherry, after a verbal altercation.
The fatally wounded Clutch crashed the Maserati he was driving into a cab that burst into flames, killing taxi driver Michael Boldon and passenger Sandra Sutton-Wasmund. A criminal complaint filed Feb. 22 in Nevada charged Harris with 11 counts, including three counts of murder with use of a deadly weapon, one count of attempted murder, two counts of discharging a firearm at or into a vehicle and five counts of discharging a firearm out of a motor vehicle.
Illustration and creation by ms. Lisa C. Jackson
April 18, 2013
City News Service
A man charged with murder and other counts in a shooting and fiery crash on the Las Vegas Strip nearly two months ago has been extradited from Los Angeles to Nevada. Ammar Harris, 27, was released just after 11:30 p.m. Monday to Nevada law enforcement officials, according to jail records. Harris was returned to Clark County, Nev., where he was awaiting a court appearance on Wednesday, according to Tess Driver of the Clark County District Attorney's Office.
He had been jailed in Los Angeles since his arrest at a Studio City apartment complex on February 28. After examining photographs and fingerprints, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Shelly Torrealba said she determined last month that Harris is ``the same individual'' being sought by the state of Nevada. Authorities allege that Harris opened fire Feb. 21 from a Range Rover on Oakland-based rap artist Kenny Clutch, legally known as Kenneth Wayne Cherry, after a verbal altercation.
The fatally wounded Clutch crashed the Maserati he was driving into a cab that burst into flames, killing taxi driver Michael Boldon and passenger Sandra Sutton-Wasmund. A criminal complaint filed Feb. 22 in Nevada charged Harris with 11 counts, including three counts of murder with use of a deadly weapon, one count of attempted murder, two counts of discharging a firearm at or into a vehicle and five counts of discharging a firearm out of a motor vehicle.
Illustration and creation by ms. Lisa C. Jackson
Monday, April 15, 2013
Tuesday, April 9, 2013
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