Tag Archives: Judge Charles Fricke

Double Trouble

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In March 1951, Ruth Gmeiner, a United Press Staff writer, published a story about the growing problem of teenage drug addiction. Officials described heroin use as a “contagious disease.”  A federal grand jury in Detroit reported they had uncovered shocking conditions . . . “Young people ranging in age between 14 and 21 have become confirmed and inveterate users of heroin.” Every big city noticed an uptick in the number of juveniles arrested on drug charges.

In Los Angeles, Robert Schoengarth started using heroin in 1948 as a student at North Hollywood Junior High School. He and a group of his friends grew marijuana in the Hollywood Hills. They weren’t entrepreneurs, they were pot philanthropists. What they didn’t consume themselves, they gave away to friends.

Raise your hand if you made stupid choices at 14. Yeah. Me too. Fortunately, my choices didn’t have lifelong consequences.

Late Wednesday evening, January 14, 1953, Morris Friedman worked behind the counter at his liquor store at 4100 Magnolia in Burbank. A dark-haired young man entered the store, bought a pack of cigarettes, and left. Moments later, he returned. He had a .22 in his pocket. He gestured at Friedman, “I want your money, sir.”

Friedman didn’t argue. He opened the cash register, grabbed a handful of bills, and handed them over. But the crook saw a few other bills in the drawer. He reached for them. Friedman grabbed the man’s arm, but the bandit pulled away and ran. The bandit was Robert.

Robert ran five blocks to his home. He replaced the gun, which belonged to his twin, William, in a dresser drawer. Passing through the living room where his father, Frank, spoke with a neighbor, he went into the front yard.

He called Frank from the house into the yard. “I told him I robbed the store.” It wasn’t Robert’s first brush with the law. Police arrested him twice before. Once for marijuana, and later for heroin. He spent time in the Los Angeles County Jail, and a California Youth Authority facility. He told his dad he’d been clean since his release. Frank didn’t believe him.

Robert said he couldn’t understand why he committed the robbery. He had a good job, making more than $62 a week as a mechanic’s apprentice. When Frank asked him for the stolen money, he gave it to him.

While Robert waited at home with his mother, Louise, for the police to arrive, Frank went to the liquor store and returned $33 to Friedman.

Patrolmen Ray Webb and Joe Mooney took Robert into custody. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” Robert said. “I suppose I have always been hanging around with the wrong crowd. That’s how I started using dope. Maybe they can put me in a hospital. Maybe it’d help me.”

Robert’s pain is palpable. So is Frank’s. Frank explained his actions by saying he wanted to help Robert, and that he feared that Robert’s twin brother, William, an aircraft worker, might be wrongly accused.

In desperation, Frank reached out to the well-known newspaperwoman, Florabel Muir. He spoke to her about Robert. “He really isn’t a bad boy. He started getting into bad company when he was in junior high school. It was then he started smoking marijuana. I didn’t know about it until he was arrested.”

Robert’s incarcerations did him no good. Frank said, “He’s only got worse with each sentence. I asked him the other night what in the world had happened to him and where he got the idea of taking a gun and sticking up somebody for money. He looked at me, sneered, and answered, ‘In jail. What do you think?’”

Back home for only a month, Robert seemed to do well. Then he asked to borrow $10. Frank couldn’t figure out why Robert would be broke right after payday—unless he was using drugs again. Robert denied it.

Frank hoped they wouldn’t return Robert to jail. He wanted him to go to a hospital for treatment. That would be up to the court. District Attorney Ernest Roll ordered a full investigation of Robert’s story. Robert told him he would “like to kick the habit if I got the chance.” He told Roll about his “graduation” from marijuana to heroin. The D.A. learned how easy it was for Robert to get high in a California Youth Camp. A friend supplied heroin through the mail.

In judge Charles Fricke’s court, Robert pleaded guilty to one count of first-degree robbery. The judge said he would place Robert in one of the California Youth Authority institutions for another chance at sobriety.

In less than two years, Robert was out of CYA and back in the news.

Police arrested him and his brother William on dope charges in February 1955. With them was a 17-year-old girl. The twins had their own place at 11920 Riverside Drive in North Hollywood. Police found a hypodermic needle kit and two caps of heroin. The girl told officers she went with Robert downtown to Temple Street, where they scored a gram of heroin from a dealer for $15.

Maybe the evidence was insufficient for prosecution, because by October Robert was again under arrest for drugs.

Police booked Robert and 18-year-old Rosalyn Berman after stopping their car on Emelita Street and Lankershim Boulevard. Robert drove erratically, and police noticed Rosalyn drop a packet from the car. Both had fresh needle marks on their arms and appeared to be under the influence.

Only 20-years-old, and Robert’s life was circling the drain.

Even after six years of addiction and legal woes, Robert was young enough to change the course of his life. Could he do it?

NEXT TIME: Robert’s story continues.

Hero or Villain? The Strange Life of Olney Le Blanc–Conclusion

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One thing I love about researching true crime is how a story can change direction. Just when I think I have someone figured out, they do something that seems out of character, and it wipes the smug expression off my face. That happened with Olney Le Blanc. 

Olney’s courage impressed me when I discovered his story in newspaper coverage from 1935. He saved his three-year-old son, Bernard, from a man who killed the boy’s puppy and likely had something awful planned for the child.

Curious about where Olney’s life would take him, I continued to search. He appeared in minor news stories about his career as a dancer, and as a teacher. By 1940, he was the recreation leader at McKinley Home for Boys in Van Nuys; a job for which he was well-suited. He lived at the home without his wife or son. Because I could not find documentation, I believe they may have separated or divorced.

I expected Olney to continue his career as a dance teacher. Maybe I’d find he and Annette had divorced. The truth caught me off-guard.

Olney was a killer.

On August 29, 1942, a call summoned Los Angeles County Sheriff’s deputies to the Carmelitos housing project, where someone had stabbed a woman. They arrived at the Carmelitos Housing Project, at the residence of June Dyer, 22-year-old mother of three.

Mildred Davis, left, and Muriel Robbins, right, of the tenant selection staff of the County Housing Authority, look over the Carmelitos low-rent housing project, located in North Long Beach. The project was the first of its kind opened in Southern California. Photo dated: October 23, 1940, courtesy of LAPL.

Ten blocks away from the scene of the murder, police found a man unconscious in a car outside a school. Someone also stabbed him. One officer made a tourniquet from the leather thong of his nightstick and stopped blood spurting from a gashed arm. They identified him as Olney Le Blanc, and booked him into the police hospital ward on suspicion of murder.

In one of his pockets they found a letter, written by June.

Dear Donald: This is a written confession of an unforgivable error I made—not in the doing, but because I kept the truth from you. Dan is not your son. You know his father. Hold it not against Danny and love him as you always have if you can.

Donald, I have deceived you many times since the beginning, even telling you I loved you. I lied.

I could never find real happiness with a lie in my heart. Mr. Leblanc has been cheated of a glorified happiness because of me. I’m doing to try to make him happy, as I know he can make me happy and be as grand a father to the boys as anyone in the world. We will work together, something you and I could never get started.

Your wife, June

Why did Olney have June’s letter in his possession?

Working for hours, Sheriff’s deputies Ed Carroll, Emmett Love and H. K. MacVine pieced together the events leading up to the murder.

A witness, 16-year-old Walter Jensen, said he saw June standing beside a car outside of her home, talking to four friends. Another car drove up, its driver called to her, and she left to talk to him.

Walter said, “They seemed to be arguing. Then he grabbed her and threw her to the ground. Walter ran to June’s aid, but the man knocked him down. Her friends carried June into her house. Her husband, Don, arrived home in time to see June die.

The U.S. was at war, and hundreds of thousands of people moved to Los Angeles for war work at shipyards and factories. June, her husband Donald, and Olney worked at Vultee, a defense plant. June and Olney worked a swing shift, and they got to know each other. When she found out he was a woodworker, she asked if he would give her instruction. Olney agreed. 

After her death, newspapers suggested June and Olney were having an affair, and called the case California’s first swing-shift murder. Staggered working hours sometimes made it difficult for spouses not to stray.

Donald took umbrage with newspapers that suggested June had broken her marriage vows. He said Olney became obsessed with June. In fact, six weeks before the murder, Olney kidnapped June, drove her to the Mojave Desert, stabbed her in the side and forced her to write a letter to Don, confessing infidelity.

Sheriff’s records proved the truth of Don’s statement. Deputies took Olney into custody and booked on suspicion of assault with a deadly weapon following the kidnapping. June and Don refused to press charges.

At the time of the kidnapping, Olney told officers, “I was so madly in love with her I didn’t know what I was doing.”

The letter found on Olney following his attempted suicide was the letter he had forced June to write.

Olney appeared for his preliminary hearing on September 15th. The judge remanded him to the County Jail without bail, pending trial, on a charge of murder.

As deputies led a shackled Olney from the courtroom, Don lunged at him, screaming, “I hope you die in a thousand hells—you didn’t have the guts to kill yourself, but you could kill June.” A bailiff shoved Don aside before he could get his hands on Olney.

In October, Olney entered a plea of not guilty by reason of insanity. The court appointed three alienists to examine Olney, and set trial for November 6 before Superior Judge Charles W. Fricke.

I’ve written about Fricke before. He was a no-nonsense jurist; some even called him a “hanging judge.” Olney was in for a rough ride.

In a surprise move, under an agreement with the D.A.’s office, Olney’s not guilty plea would stand. No witnesses would be called before Judge Fricke, who would use a transcript of the preliminary hearing and to have the court consider it as the evidence in determining Olney’s guilt or innocence, and the punishment if any.

On November 23rd, Judge Fricke found Olney guilty of first-degree murder, and sentenced him to life imprisonment.

Why did Olney’s life unravel? When I first found his story, it seemed he would lead a happy and productive life. How did he go from saving his son from a kidnapper to murdering June with a German sword?

I accept I will never know.

Death of a Brute

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During the 1910s, over two million Italians immigrated to the United States; among them, Rosario Trovinano from Sicily.

Rosario’s family arranged a marriage for her with Alberto Ciani, a barber, several years her senior. She and Albert married in Syracuse, New York on June 16, 1913. Rosario gave her age as 18, she was 16. Unlike most arranged marriages, the couple never reached a place of mutual respect and affection.

Rosa & Albert Ciani

Over twenty years of their married life, Albert beat her and their children—especially the girls whom he seemed to loathe. According to Rosa, Albert “tried to destroy” the girls when they were born. He took them to the beach and pushed them into deep water. Once, when she was pouring milk to feed their youngest child, Gloria, he caught her and threw the milk away. Then he sat down and ate two steaks and a half-dozen eggs while his hungry wife and children looked on.

The couple argued constantly. Florence, their eldest daughter, left home in 1931 to become a beauty operator. She said she often heard her mother and dad “scrapping.” The argument centered on which one of them gave the other one a “dreaded disease,” likely syphilis. The final straw for Florence was when Albert attempted to murder her when she tried to intervene in one of their arguments. The D.A. dropped the charges against Albert when Rosa, afraid of the consequences, declined to testify.

On Sunday evening, September 10, 1933, after another bitter fight, Albert told Rosa she need not finish the preserving she was doing because she would not be there long, and neither would the children. Would he make good on his threats to kill them? Albert went to the bedroom to sleep. In her nightgown, Rosa slipped into the kitchen, heated some coffee, and poured a large measure of olive oil into a pot. She waited. When the oil reached the boiling point, she took the pot into the bedroom and poured the contents into Albert’s eyes.

Screaming in agony, Albert stumbled around the room. Rosa picked up the axe she had purchased with $1.50 Florence gave her. Raising the heavy blade above her head, she struck. The first blow cleaved Albert’s back and punctured a lung. The second strike sliced his shoulder, almost completely severing an arm.

As their children, Catherine, Susan, and Samuel, looked on in horror, Rosa continued the attack. The children pleaded with her to stop. She quit only when Albert fell unconscious to the floor after she hacked his legs out from under him.

Lincoln Heights Jail

Answering the horrified calls of neighbors, Detective Lieutenants Connor and Patton arrived at the Ciani home at 10464 South Hoover Street. They rushed Albert, who was on the brink of death, to the Georgia Street Receiving Hospital, where he succumbed within minutes.

The police found Rosa outside the home. She kissed her children goodbye, then surrendered to the police outside the home. They transported her to Lincoln Heights Jail. Later, from her cell, a defiant Rosa said, “I’m glad I did it. I’d kill him even now to protect my children and myself!”

The coroner’s jury found she had killed Albert by pouring four gallons of boiling oil on him and hacking him with an axe. Public defender John J. Hill was assigned to represent Rosa.

In December, three alienists, Drs. Paul Bowers, Victor Parkin, and Edwin Wayne reported to Judge Fletcher Bowron. They agreed Rosa was sane when she killed Albert. They explained the crime, saying she was “driven to distraction” by her husband’s brutality. Judge Bowron granted Hill’s request for a continuance and set the trial for January 25, 1934. Hill hinted Rosa might change her plea to guilty.

On January 25, 1934, over the objections of her daughter Florence, Rosa pleaded guilty to manslaughter before Judge Burnell. The judge delayed the sentence until the following day. Rosa’s family and friends would testify to the mitigating circumstances that caused her to snap.

Judge Charles Burrell sentenced Rosa to San Quentin for manslaughter; but stated he wished he could give her probation. He requested the state board of prison terms and paroles to show compassion for the defendant in an unexpected move. He said for years Rosa had endured cruel treatment at Albert’s hands, including repeated beatings, choking of her children, and the willful withholding of food, while he feasted in front of them. Judge Burnell supported her attorney, John J. Hill. Hill urged for Rosa’s immediate release and recommended that Governor James “Sunny Jim” Rolph grant executive clemency.

The Governor listened, and on April 26, 1934 he commuted Rosa’s sentence to time served.