White Jazz

A down to the wire run was expected in the race for Fifth District City Councilman; today’s election vote should have been nip and tuck. But while state, municipal, and judicial candidates nervously awaited poll news, incumbent Republican Councilman Thomas Bethune relaxed with his family at his Hancock Park home.

Up until last week, Bethune was hotly challenged by Morton Diskant, his liberal Democratic opponent. Diskant, stressing his credentials as a civil liberties lawyer, sought to portray Bethune as a pawn of the Los Angeles political establishment, his chief focus the Chavez Ravine issue. The Fifth Councilmanic District, which has a 25 % Negro population, became a litmus test: how would voters respond when an entire campaign revolved around whether or not to relocate impoverished Latin Americans in an attempt to create space for a Los Angeles Dodgers ballpark?

Diskant pressed that issue, along with what he called “collateral matters”: the allegedly overzealous enforcement measures of the Los Angeles Police Department and the “Gas Chamber Happy” Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office. More than a litmus test, the Fifth District race was crucial to the passage of the Chavez Ravine bond issue: a Council straw vote showed that body currently standing 5 to 4 in favor, with all other Republican and Democratic candidates vying for Council seats also voicing their approval of the measure. Thus, only Diskant’s election could force a City Council deadlock and legally postpone the wedding of Chavez Ravine and the Dodgers for some time.

But it was not to be. Last week, Diskant dropped out of the race, just as straw polls began to show him pulling ahead of his incumbent opponent. The Chavez Ravine Council vote will remain 5 to 4 in favor, and the bond issue is expected to be voted into law in mid-November. Diskant cited “personal reasons” as his motive for withdrawing; he did not elaborate further. Speculation in political circles has raged, and U.S. Attorney Welles Noonan, Chief Federal Prosecutor for the greater Southern California District, voiced this opinion to Times reporter Jerry Abrams: “I won’t name names, and frankly I can’t name names. But Diskant’s withdrawal smacks of some sort of coercion. And I’ll go on the record as a Democrat and a determined crimefighter with credentials including work for the McClellan Senate Rackets Committee: you can be both a moderate liberal and a foe of crime, as my good friend Senator John Kennedy proved by his work for the Committee.”

Noonan declined to answer questions on his own political ambitions, and Morton Diskant could not be reached to voice his response. Councilman Bethune told the Times: “I hated to win this way, because I relish a good fight. Get those hot dogs and peanuts ready, [Dodger organization president] Walter O’Malley, because I’m putting in for season tickets. Play ball!”

It was no surprise: Robert “Call Me Bob” Gallaudet, 38, a former LAPD and DA’s Bureau officer who went to USC Law School nights, was elected Los Angeles District Attorney yesterday, topping a six man field with 59 % of the total votes cast.

His election marks a fast rising career streaked with good luck, chiefly the resignation of former DA Ellis Loew last April. Gallaudet, then Loew’s favored prosecutor, was appointed interim DA by the City Council, largely, it was believed, because of his friendship with LAPD Chief of Detectives Edmund Exley. A Republican, Gallaudet is expected to run for State Attorney General in 1960. He is a staunch law and order advocate, and a frequent target of death penalty repeal groups, who consider him overzealous in his recommendations of capital punishment.

A recent barb was thrown at the new District Attorney from another angle. Welles Noonan, U.S. Attorney for the Southern California Federal District and often spoken of as Gallaudet’s likely opponent in the Attorney General’s race, told the Mirror: “DA Gallaudet’s support of the District Gambling Bill currently stalled in the California State Legislature stands out as a startling contradiction to this man’s supposedly bedrock anti-crime philosophy. That bill [i.e. — proposed legitimate gambling zones confined to certain areas surveilled by local police agencies, where cards, slot machines, off track betting and other games of chance will be legal, but heavily surtaxed for State revenue purposes] is a moral outrage that condones compulsive gambling under the guise of political good. It will become a magnet for organized crime, and I exhort DA Gallaudet to retract his support of the measure.”

At a press conference to announce his upcoming victory gala at the Ambassador Hotel’s Cocoanut Grove two nights from now, Gallaudet pooh-poohed his critics, chiefly U.S. Attorney Noonan. “Look, he’s running against me for A.G. already, and I just got elected to this job. On my political future: no comment. My comment on my election as Los Angeles District Attorney: watch out, criminals. And take heart, Angelenos: I’m here to make this city a peaceful, safe haven for all its law-abiding citizens.”

Dig it, kats and kittens, chicks and charlies: we love the national pastime as much as you do, but enough is enough. Doesn’t that great lady the Statue of Liberty have some kind of rebop inscribed by her tootsies? Something like: “Give us your poor, huddled, wretched masses yearning to be free?” Look, east coast geography isn’t our strong suit, and we can tell you’re tired of this patriotic shtick already. Look, everybody wants a bonaroo home for the Dodgers, us included. But — iconoclasm dictates that we take a different tack, if only for the sake of our circuitously circling circulation. Social protest from Hush-Hush! They said it couldn’t happen! Remember, dear reader, you heard it first here!

Dig: The L.A. City Council is set to boot an egregiously entrenched enclave of impecunious, impoverished, impetuously machismo mangled Mexican-Americans from their sharecropper shingle shacks in that shady, smog-shrouded Shangri-La Chavez Ravine!!! Those pennant flopper, fly ball dropper L.A. Dodgers are moving in as soon as the dust clears and a stadium is built — and they’ll have a new home from which to rule the National League cellar!!! Dig it!! You’re happy, we’re happy!! Go, Dodgers!!! But what will happen to those dourly dispossessed, Dodger doomed delinquents: the maladroitly mismanaged Mexicans?

Digsville: The California State Bureau of Land and Way is granting shack dwellers $10,500 per family relocation expenses, roughly 1/2 the cost of a slipshod, slapdash slum pad in such colorful locales as Watts, Willowbrook and Boyle Heights. The Bureau is also enterprisingly examining dervishly developed dump dives proferred by rapaciously rapid real estate developers: would-be Taco Terraces and Enchilada Estates where Burrito Bandits bounced from shamefully sheltered Chavez Ravine could live in jerry-rigged slum splendor, frolicking to fleabag firetrap fandangos!

Dig, we’ve heard that among the sites being considered are converted horse paddock — jail cells once used to house Japanese internees during World War II, and a converted bungalow motel in Lynwood, replete with heart shaped beds and cheesy gilt-edged mirrors. Say! Those places sound like the office here at Hush-Hush!!!

Hey! The rent here on the sin-tillating, salivatingly sensational Sunset Strip has steadily steepened — and we’ve heard that several dismayingly disgusted dispossessees have put in for their money and moved back to Mexico ahead of the general eviction date, leaving behind abandoned shacks! Hey — Hush-Hush could move its operations into them! As a result, we could charge a lower price for this rag! If you believe that, we’ll sell you a Pendejo Penthouse and a brand-new Chorizo Chevrolet!

But, to close on a more serious note, it appears that the L.A. powers-that-be have a front man chatting up the many remaining Chavez Ravine dwellers, passing out trinkets and doing his best to convince them to move out before the established eviction date without seeking legal injunctions. That man: popular bantamweight battler Reuben Ruiz, currently ranked 8th by Ring Magazine, a man whom Hush-Hush hastens to charge with a checkably checkered past.

Item:

Reuben Ruiz served time at the Preston Reformatory for juvenile burglary.

Item:

Reuben Ruiz has three brothers: Ramon, Reyes and Reynaldo—! God! — alliteration to make Hush-Hush proud! — and all three men have burglary and/or grand theft auto convictions on their records.

Item:

Reuben Ruiz was a guarded witness during Federal bright boy Welles Noonan’s recently short lived boxing probe. (You recall that probe, hepcats: another witness jumped out the window while the LAPD detective guarding him resided in Snooze City.)

Item:

Reuben Ruiz was spotted a few days ago, lunching at the Pacific Dining Car with DA Bob Gallaudet and City Councilman Thomas Bethune. A late breaking extra, on the Q.T. and very Hush-Hush:

Reuben Ruiz’ brother Ramon was arrested for grand theft auto several days before, but now the charges have been mysteriously dropped...

A captivatingly corrosive coercion conclusion to consider:

Is Reuben Ruiz a bagman — P.R. man for the DA’s Office and City Council? Does Ruiz’ hellacious hermano rowdy Ramon owe his freedom to Reuben’s politically prudent pandering? Will Reuben’s extra-curricular efforts extricate his lethal left hook when he fights tough Stevie Moore at the Olympic next week?

Remember, dear reader, you heard it first here: off the record, on the Q.T. and very Hush-Hush.

You all know Sol “The Fur King” Hurwitz, hepcats: he does his own commercials on TV’s Spade Cooley Show. His running gag is an animated snowstorm descending on Grauman’s Chinese Theatre while unprepared Angelenos shiver in Bermuda shorts. He cuts these commercials on a sound stage made up like an igloo, with his marionette mascot Maurizio Mink supplying a hard sell Greek chorus: scientists are predicting a new ice age several centuries down the line, buy your Hurwitz Fur now at rock bottom low prices, easy monthly payments, store your fur during the “off season” at our San Fernando Valley fur warehouse free of charge. Follow the drift, kats and kittens? Sol Hurwitz knows that fur is a preposterous Southern California item, and he’s poking fun at himself while neglecting to mention the basic fact of his business: people buy furs for two reasons: to look good and to show off how much money they have.

Dig that especially L.A. ethos? Good, you’re on our wavelength. Dig further that Hurwitz’ free storage come-on is good for lots of biz. Shiver, shiver, brrrr. Your beloved Charlie Chinchilla, Mindy Mink and Rachel Raccoon are safe with Sol, right? Well, up until October 25th you weren’t whistling Dixie...

On that fateful night, three or four daring desperadoes presumed to have toolmaking and electronics expertise furtively furthered their criminal careers by overpowering a security guard and absconding with an estimated one million dollars in “Off-Season” storaged furs. Did you read the small print on your “free” storage contracts, kool kats? If not, dig: in case of theft, Hurwitz Furs’ insurance carrier reimburses you at the rate of 25 % of the estimated value of your lost stole or coat, and furthermore, the police have no clues as to who these furshtinkener furtive fur heisters are!

Captain Dudley Smith, head of the LAPD’s Robbery Division, told reporters at Van Nuys Station: “We know that a large flatbed truck was the means of entry and escape, and the regrettably injured guard told us that three or four men wearing stocking masks disabled him. A complex freezer locking system was dismantled, giving the robbers access to the furs. Technical expertise is an obvious strong point of this gang of thieves, and I will not rest until they are apprehended.”

Assisting Captain Smith are Sergeant Michael Breuning and Sergeant Richard Carlisle. A surprise addition to the celebrated crimebuster’s team: Officer John Duhamel, known to So Cal fight fans as “Schoolboy” Johnny Duhamel, former middleweight Golden Gloves champ. Captain Smith, Sergeant Breuning and Sergeant Carlisle refused to talk to Hush-Hush, but ace Hush-Hush scribe Duane Tucker cornered Officer “Schoolboy” Duhamel at last week’s Hollywood Legion Stadium fistfest. Off the record, on the Q.T. and very Hush-Hush, Officer “Schoolboy” spoke out of school.

He called the robbery a baffler, and ruled out insurance fraud, even though Sol Hurwitz is rapaciously rumored to be a dice game degenerate. “Schoolboy” then bit his tongue and offered no further comments.

In a further development, a score of furious furmeisters picketed Sol Hurwitz’ Pacoima scene-of-the-crime storage facility. With a scant 25 % assessed value refund coming to them, these perplexed parents impatiently importuned Mindy Mink, Rachel Raccoon and Charlie Chinchilla:

Come home! It’s 80 degrees and we’re freezing without you!

Look for further developments in upcoming Crimewatch features. Remember, you heard it furst here: off the record, on the Q.T. and very Hush-Hush!

This morning, in a brief, tersely worded prepared statement, U.S. Attorney Welles Noonan announced that Justice Department investigators assigned to the Southern California District Office would soon begin a “minutely detailed, complex and far reaching” probe into racketeering in South-Central Los Angeles. He called his investigation a “gathering of evidence aimed at establishing criminal conspiracies”; he said that his goal was to present “convincing evidence” to a specially convened Federal Grand Jury, with an eye toward securing major indictments.

Noonan, 40, former counsel to the U.S. Senate’s McClellan Rackets Committee, said that his investigation would encompass crimes including narcotics trafficking, jukebox, vending machine and slot machine illegalities, and that he would “thoroughly explore” rumors that the Los Angeles Police Department allows vice to rage in Southside Los Angeles and rarely investigates homicides involving both Negro victims and perpetrators.

The U.S. Attorney declined to answer reporters’ questions, but stated that his task force would include four prosecuting attorneys and at least a dozen specially selected Justice Department agents. He closed his press conference stating that he fully expects the Los Angeles Police Department to refuse to cooperate with the probe.

LAPD Chief William H. Parker and Chief of Detectives Edmund Exley were informed of U.S. Attorney Noonan’s announcement. They declined to comment.