Rayner - A bright and guilty place: murder, corruption, and L.A.s scandalous coming of age

Leslie White: An eager and bespectacled young photographer turned investigator whose experiences in Los Angeles later inspire his career as a pulp-fiction writer.

Dave Clark: A suave war hero and crusading prosecutor, drawn into the darkness of the rackets.

Nancy Clark: A petite blonde, daughter of a famed New York judge and Dave Clarks volatile yet adoring wife.

Albert Marco, aka Marco Albori: A plug-ugly gangster brought down by Clark.

Gene Coughlin: A top reporter for many L.A. papers, notably the tabloid Illustrated Daily News, who comes to know Clark only too well.

Buron Fitts: A decorated WWI marine and longtime District Attorney for Los Angeles, he becomes an immensely controversial and influential figure in the citys history.

Asa Ace Keyes: Fittss predecessor as D.A., indicted for bribery.

Lucien Wheeler: A graduate of Notre Dame, secret service bodyguard to presidents, FBI bureau chief, and private eyea man of power and subtlety, carving a high-profile career in law enforcement.

Blayney Matthews: An investigator for Buron Fitts and another former FBI man, he was also Whites colleague and pal.

C. C. Julian: A breezy oil speculator and Ponzi-scheme operator whose company, Julian Petroleum (the Julian Pete), seizes the imagination of L.A.and much of the citys cash.

Jake Berman, aka Jack Bennett: A slick and handsome con artist, milking millions from the house of cards that Julian built.

E. L. Doheny: An aging oil magnatethe richest man in L.A. in the 1920s, and one of the richest in Americaembroiled in the nationwide scandal known as Teapot Dome.

Ned Doheny, Jr.: His only son, found dead with a bullet in his brain one night in 1929.

Hugh Plunkett: Neds personal secretary, chauffeur, friend, and possibly more; he is also found shot through the head.

Charlie Crawford, aka The Gray Wolf: A one-time saloon keeper who runs the Los Angeles System, the discreet yet all-powerful and money-spinning network of graft and racketeering; he meets his end with a slug from a Colt pistol.

Kent Parrot: A USC football hero, law school graduate, and political force; he is also Crawfords enabler who has the mayor in his pocket.

Morris Lavine: A famed newsman for the Los Angeles Examiner with a finger in too many corrupt pies; he later becomes a top attorney.

Erle Stanley Gardner: An attorney in Ventura County who works at his law firm all day and writes 4,000 words of fiction every night; he becomes a close friend of Leslie Whites.

Raymond Chandler: The future noir laureate of L.A., who worked through the 1920s as an oil executive; he sees and remembers it all.

Dashiell Hammett: The former Pinkerton detective and leading light of hardboiled writing; he plays an unwitting part in the demise of a Hollywood star.

The Reverend Robert Fighting Bob Shuler: A radio evangelist whose down-home appeal and attacks on Hollywood depravity make him a political player.

The Reverend Gustav Briegleb: Shulers onetime lieutenant and later his rival; friend to Charlie Crawford.

Motley Flint: A banker to Hollywood and brother to a U.S. senator; gunned down in court.

Clara Bow: The biggest movie star of her era, a reckless redheaded bombshell who beds Gary Cooper, John Gilbert, John Wayne, et al., et al.

Daisy DeVoe: Clara Bows tough and smart-mouthed assistant, herself no slouch in the vixen department.

Herbert Spencer: Another reporter working all the angles; also killed by a bullet.

Guy McAfee: Nicknamed Slats and Beanpole due to his height; onetime LAPD vice cop turned racketeer; plotting to seize control of The System.

June Taylor: Albert Marcos trusted confidante and a knockout brothel keeper; instrumental in Clarks downfall.

W. I. Gilbert: A canny defense attorney and friend to the stars, celebrated for his courtroom stunts.

Joseph Ford: A veteran prosecutor and founder of the law school at Loyola Marymount University.

Lincoln Steffens: Author of The Shame of the Cities, classic muckraking account of urban American graft, and a mentor to Leslie White.

With supporting appearances from:

William Mulholland, Roscoe Fatty Arbuckle, Earl Rogers, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Edmund Wilson, Louis Adamic, Carey McWilliams, Al Capone, Budd Schulberg, B. P. Schulberg, Alexander Pantages, Jerry Giesler, David O. Selznick, Charlie Chaplin, Albert Einstein, Myron Brinnig, John Fante, Horace McCoy, James M. Cain and others.

C HARLIE CRAWFORD AND EDITOR SLAIN! screamed the headline in the Los Angeles Illustrated Daily News. The date was Thursday, March 20, 1931. At about 4:30 P.M. the previous afternoon the fifty-four-year-old Crawford, nicknamed The Gray Wolf because of the silvery-gray hair that waved and curled across his head, had been gunned down in his office on Sunset Boulevard. Also killed was Herbert Spencer, a veteran journalist whod been with Crawford in the room. EX-BOSS FALLS TO LONG-FEARED GUNMAN BULLET, the News went on. Crawford, kingpin politician, lived until 8:32 P.M. last night, a little more than four hours after the shooting. He died without revealing the identity of his assailant, according to detectives

Crawford had been, and many believed he still was, a boss, a key player in what was known as The System, a low-profile but all-powerful syndicate that ran the gambling, prostitution, and bootlegging rackets in Los Angeles. He was the most feared and dictatorial power in the city, its behind-the-scenes czar, wrote Beverly Davis, who ran an upscale brothel for Crawford. You could get away with murder under his wing. This was L.A.s brand of gangsterism: Crawford used officers of the Los Angeles Police Department to collect the take from the underworld captains. He worked behind the scenes with Kent Kane Parrot, a fixer whod had George Cryer, the mayor of Los Angeles from 192129, pretty much in his pocket. It was a discreet yet effective arrangement that had been in place since Crawford and Parrot contrived to get Cryer elected. As far as the rackets were concerned, L.A. had been a closed town ever since, locked down by Crawford and The System. It was the most lucrative, the most efficient, and the best-entrenched graft operation in the country, News city editor Matt Weinstock wrote later. Now somebody was monkeying with that operation, trying to destroy it perhaps, or take it over.

Racketeer bullets declared open warfare in the Los Angeles underworld yesterday, said the L.A. Examiner. MAN HUNT ON! An announcement went out over the newly perfected LAPD radio system: Wanted for murderan American, about six feet tall, weighing between 150 and 175 pounds, and between 35 and 40 years of age. Hair, brown. A small black moustache. Dressed in neat blue suit and wearing sailor straw hat.

Was this the killer? It seemed so.

The political structure rocked precariously while everybody tried to imagine who could have fired the fatal shots, wrote Leslie White, a young detective working in the investigative unit of the District Attorneys office. For White, the case had a particular significance, a poignancy almost. Hed met Charlie Crawford several times and had liked him. Despite the unanimous opinion that the murder of Crawford was a piece of civic betterment, I felt a pang, White wrote. Would his death improve the city in any way? I doubted it. A new boss might be less efficiently corrupt. The King was deadbut who would seek the throne?