State Official’s ’61 Murder Conviction Confirmed

A state official arrested last month on a charge of soliciting a bribe was convicted of second-degree murder 25 years ago and served more than 10 years in California prisons, a Justice Department spokeswoman confirmed Thursday.

The background of Larry Kemble Callahan, a $36,480-a-year government program analyst for the state’s Victims of Violent Crimes program, was reported Monday by television station KOVR in Sacramento.

Callahan, who investigated and certified claims made by crime victims seeking state reimbursement for injuries and other losses, was arrested Nov. 17 on a corner outside a state office building in Los Angeles after allegedly accepting a $1,000 bribe to approve the claim of a crime victim who was cooperating with authorities.

Callahan was fired that day and has been free on $3,000 bail pending arraignment next Wednesday in Los Angeles.

KOVR reported that Callahan, 49, has been a state employee, working under his true name, for seven years, winning promotions to increasingly more responsible positions in the California Youth Authority, Napa State Hospital, the Department of Social Services and the Board of Control and that his current supervisors had no idea of his past.

Justice Department spokeswoman Kati Corsaut said Thursday that fingerprints and other records confirm that Callahan is the same Larry Callahan who was convicted of second-degree murder in San Francisco in 1961 and served 10 years and three months in California prisons, mostly at Vacaville.

Contacted by KOVR, Callahan indirectly confirmed the account of his past, telling the reporter who aired the first story, “You’ve done a dirty thing. You dragged up something after 25 years.”

Anne Garbeff of the state Department of General Services, who confirmed Callahan’s state employment record, said the state cannot ask prospective employees about prior criminal convictions unless they are seeking law enforcement and related posts. None of Callahan’s jobs fit that category, she said.

According to prison records, Callahan was sentenced to five years to life for the second-degree murder in San Francisco of night club owner Melvin Ward and was paroled in November, 1971. News accounts at the time said that Callahan, then an amateur singer, stabbed Ward at his home during an argument.

State records say Callahan was hired for a clerical-administrative position by the California Youth Authority in 1979, transferred a few months later to the staff of Napa State Hospital, where he worked two years as a psychiatric social worker, and was hired as an analyst by the Department of Social Services in 1982.

In January, 1983, he transferred to the Board of Control in a mid-level position as staff services analyst and was promoted six months later to associate government programs analyst.