Murder, robbery, and suicide in the back alleys, liquor stores, and bedrooms of Los Angeles. Warning: graphic images and NSFW.
"Great police photographs offer up explicitness in perfect proportion," writes James Ellroy in his introduction to LAPD '53.
© 2015 Los Angeles Police Museum
A detective points at a bullet hole in the wall of a dive hotel, put there by a detective in pursuit of one of the residents who was stashing heroin in his room. The bullet that killed him went through his body and hit the wall.
© 2015 Los Angeles Police Museum
Emmett Perkins and Jack Santo were the kind of bad guys even bad guys didn't like. They went on a killing spree near Sacramento, slaughtering a local family for $6,000 in grocery store receipts: dad, mum, three kids, all dumped in the boot of the dad's car. Then they murdered an old lady called Mabel Monohan who was rumoured to keep $100,000 in her house for when she needed bail out her gambler son-in-law. They invaded her home wearing masks (modelled above by a cop), failed to find $100,000, murdered her anyway. When the manhunt went public, informants were numerous: everyone wanted to grass up Emmett Perkins and Jack Santo.
© 2015 Los Angeles Police Museum
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10 Grisly Police Crime Photos That Expose The Lurid Underside Of LA In 1953