Ex-Secretary to Chief Gates Beaten to Death

A woman who for more than six years served as a secretary to Los Angeles Police Chief Daryl F. Gates apparently was beaten to death in her Athens-area home during the weekend, authorities said Monday.

The body of Aleta Marie Browne, 39, was discovered by a neighbor about 7:30 a.m. Saturday in Browne’s home in the 1400 block of West 126th Street, said a spokesman for the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. The house, in an unincorporated area in the southern section of the county, was ransacked and Browne’s car was missing, authorities said.

The Los Angeles County coroner’s office officially listed the cause of death as asphyxia due to compression of the neck, an office spokesman said.

Bruce Cureton, a brother, said Monday that Browne’s family was devastated by the killing. He said that their father, Gonzelo J. Cureton Sr., died less than two years ago. Browne is survived by her mother and three brothers, one of whom is a sergeant in the Police Department, and a former husband, also a police officer.

Browne served as a secretary in Gates’ office from April, 1981, until last Nov. 8, when she was promoted to supervise the records section of the department’s Southwest Division, said Officer Margie Reid, a police spokeswoman. Browne was hired by the department in 1968. She earned a bachelor’s degree in sociology from Cal State Dominquez Hills in 1977, her brother said.

No suspects are in custody, the sheriff’s spokesman said.