My Ticket to Becoming King of L.A.

The only reason I’m ratting on myself is because I want this to be a lesson to all the young punks in the neighborhood who idolize me. I want them to know that even though L.A. is a tough town, it can be had. For me, becoming King of L.A. all began one fall day not too long ago . . . .

. . . The motorcycle cop U-turned, his siren churning, and motioned to me on the sidewalk with an accusing finger. I thought of taking my chances and making a break for it. I even knew a church on a nearby side street where I could take cover and maybe seek sanctuary. That is, if I could make it there. My legs weren’t what they used to be, and the cop was already dismounting--one chubby, booted leg crossing over the other, his hand resting nervously on his side just inches above his gun holster.

So I just waited for him to approach me, his white helmet shining in the noonday sun that his opaque-sunglass-shaded eyes were protecting him from. Standing there naked-eyed, wearing just an old cloth hat, I obviously was no match for him. I had not even dreamed of bringing a gun of my own with me. Which seemed like making the same kind of dumb mistake that Dillinger made the night he went to the movie house in Chicago with the woman in red.

But that’s what the L.A. cops are good at. Waiting for you to slip up. And I had done just that when I drove into West L.A. that afternoon to satisfy a sudden craving for soba by having lunch at a noodle shop on Sawtelle. I had parked my car, put a quarter into the parking meter as if I was some kind of a 100% law-abiding citizen, and headed across the street. It was then that I heard the sound of the motorcycle and its siren blaring behind me.

As I say, I could have tried to make a dash for it. But at heart I’m not the worst citizen in the world. And who knows what goes on in the heads of the LAPD and what orders come down on them anyway? Suppose this clown chased after me and shot into the crowd of onlookers? Then they’d really hang a rapon me.

So I just stood there and didn’t try to take off. Not even when the cop turned his broad back and returned to his idling bike to get a leather-bound pad. He flipped it open and asked for my ID, and I showed him my driver’s license. Then he began to write, spelling out the crime he had caught me committing. Which was to cross the street “outside of X walk forcing S/B vehls to yield.”

I told him to his face he was chicken and he called me “sir” and said that any southbound vehicle would have had the right not to yield and hit me. And I told him, speaking as a licensed driver, that he was full of crap. He disagreed with me but still kept calling me “sir” anyway.

He made me sign for the violation slip, ripped it off and handed it to me. There was no point in arguing the violation anymore, and I watched him remount his bike and gun away. But I’ll always be grateful to him. For, in handing me that violation, he gave me the key to the city.

Let me explain: The incident gave me the idea that got me to the top, made the King of L.A., more powerful than Mickey or Bugsy had ever been. Because I now knew just how to neutralize and immobilize the LAPD completely. And within a month I had every racket in place, and the city was rampant with crime. Daryl Gates never knew what hit him, but all me and the boys did was just hire the homeless to go jay-walking.