He Walked by Night

This is Los Angeles.

Our Lady, The Queen of the Angels,

as the Spaniards named her.

The fastest growing city in the nation.

It's been called a bunch of suburbs in search of a city.

And it's been called the glamour capital of the world.

A mecca for tourists, a stopover for transients,

a target for gangsters,

a haven for those fleeing from winter,

a home for the hardworking.

It is a city holding

the hopes and dreams of over 2 million people.

It sprawls out horizontally

over 452 square miles of valleys and upland,

of foothills and beaches.

Because of that vast area,

and because of a population

made up of people from every state in the union,

Los Angeles is the largest police beat in the country

and one of the toughest.

We're going to take you into the city hall,

where police headquarters are located.

Here, in communications,

are the ears and voice of the police.

The lights on the complaint board flash 24 hours a day.

Citizens reporting a prowler, a lost child,

a man molesting a woman,

an auto accident, a wild party.

Spend an hour or two here and you will think

the whole city has gone berserk.

Minute by minute, the orders go out

to the radio cars in the far-flung divisions.

Watts and Wilshire in West Los Angeles.

Hollywood and Hollenbeck Heights in North Hollywood.

The work of the police, like that of woman, is never done.

This is the case history of a killer,

taken from the files of the detective division.

The facts are told here as they happened.

The story properly starts here

in Hollywood Division headquarters

at 1:00 of a June morning last year.

Officer Robert Rawlins had finished

his tour of duty and signed out.

It had been a tough day. He'd be glad to get home.

His wife would be waiting up for him,

as she always did.

Hey, fella. Come here.

What were you doing back at that radio shop?

Just looking. I was on my way home.

Live around here?

Yeah, a couple of blocks down.

Let me see some identification.

Sure.

Yeah, I guess I forgot my wallet.

Look, lad, I've got to see some identification.

How about my army discharge? I got it right here.

Police department, operator 27.

I want to report the shooting of a policeman.

Hold on, please.

Give me that again, please.

I'm calling to report the shooting of a policeman.

What's the address?

5057 State Street, just west of Santa Monica.

Just a minute.

Receiving hospital, operator 2.

Operator 27, 5-0-5-7 State Street.

5057 State Street. An officer's been shot.

Send an ambulance.

All units.

All units in the vicinity of State Street,

Santa Monica Boulevard.

Proceed at once to 5057 State Street.

5-0-5-7 State Street.

An officer shot. Code 3.

- (engines revving) - (sirens blaring)

80-K to Control One.

Control One to 80-K, go ahead.

This is Breen.

Instruct homicide to throw out a dragnet

and pick up all suspicious characters

in the area of the shooting.

Also notify sergeants Marty Brennan and Chuck Jones

to report to me at the scene of the crime.

Control One to 80-K.

Roger.

- (engine starts) - (siren blaring)

I see. Well, what have you got so far?

Well, not much, Captain Breen.

A couple of cartridge cases.

Hello, Marty, Chuck.

Hi, Captain.

Eyewitnesses? Who was first on the scene, reported it?

I was. I... I live here. I... I'm a light sleeper,

but my hearing is good and my...

Did the officer say anything before he collapsed?

Yeah, he gave a description of the fellow. He was...

...on the shooting of the officer:

suspect is a white male American,

age 26 or 27,

5'10 " or 5'11",

155 to 165 pounds.

Brown hair. Regular features. Pencil mustache.

Repeat broadcast. All units...

- Is that about it? - Yes, sir. Exactly.

And the officer kept saying, "He looked like such a nice kid.

He looked like such a nice kid."

As if he couldn't believe what had happened to him.

- I see. Is that all? - Yeah.

Thank you very much.

Well, anything else I can do, I'd be glad to help you.

We may call you.

Get his name and address, will you, Bob?

This door been checked, Lee?

Yeah, it's ok, Captain.

Find anything?

Nothing but some smudges so far.

Found this in the glove compartment.

I think it's nitroglycerine.

Doesn't look quite right.

Well, check it down at the lab.

Right.

Come on.

Open this up, Joe.

No key, Captain.

Well, pry it open.

Give me that bar, Frank.

Hmm.

A regular arsenal.

Yeah, and get a load of that.

What is it?

I don't know. It looks like

some kind of an electrical device.

United States Navy.

Either stolen or war surplus.

Send all this stuff down to the lab

and check the serial number on that navy equipment.

Yes, sir.

Captain Breen.

We found these in the weeds over by the radio store.

Hmm. What have you got?

A pair of cloth gloves, Captain.

He thought of everything, didn't he?

All right, give them to one of the technicians.

Yes, sir.

Marty, you and Chuck come along with me.

Let's go downtown and see

what they've picked up in the dragnet.

Right.

You know him, Marty?

Yeah.

I know his wife, too.

Ever since high school.

Captain, I wish you'd let Chuck and me handle this case.

All right. But I don't want any dead heroes.

I just want the man who shot Rawlins.

The suspects began to arrive

at headquarters in droves.

The police tossed every motel and hotel

and many private homes in a 4-square-mile area

around the scene of the shooting.

Every available radio car and patrolman

and detective was out on the dragnet.

The strings were being drawn tighter and tighter.

Many a man returning from a date or a late party

or a poker game

surprisingly found himself in a squad car,

its sirens screaming as it brought him

to the detective bureau.

The dragnet gathered in some strange fish,

and many ordinary ones.

All the rest of that night, the detectives probed,

needled, questioned, quizzed.

Everything was checked:

fingerprints, names, addresses, stories.

Every fish in the net was examined,

most of them thrown back into the sea,

not worth keeping.

Except a few parole violators and slightly shady characters

whose stories needed a lot of verifying.

I wasn't prowling no cars.

Just taking a walk. You know, getting in condition.

You were running when the radio car picked you up.

Yeah? Maybe that's why the guys call me punchy.

He's got a point there.

Two felony convictions. No warrant.

No warrant. He's on parole.

Book him. Violation of parole.

Let's have the next one, Joe.

What were you doing in that vacant lot?

The vacant lot. Lot.

What were you doing in it at that time of night?

you say your name is Ralph Henderson.

So what?

Well, you know, it's a funny thing, Ralph.

There's a guy around this town