A uniformed officer was chasing a purse-snatcher...

A uniformed officer was chasing a purse-snatcher on Olvera Street the other day when a passer-by intervened and threw a crushing block on the suspect. Purse and purse-snatcher tumbled to the ground. Happy ending? Not quite.

What the Good Samaritan didn’t realize was that the officer and bad guy were actors, and the chase was being filmed for a new “Adam 12” cop series on KTTV, Channel 11. The real-life victim, actor John Escobar, was taken to the hospital where he was treated for minor injuries.

“The guy really gave him a good shoulder,” marveled director Burt Armus, himself a retired New York cop. “Our actor is a stunt man but he wasn’t ready for that.”

Still, Armus said, Escobar took it in good humor. “He knew it was a fluke,” the director said. “Like the rest of us he thought it was refreshing that someone would want to get involved.”

A few days later, the film crew nearly experienced the same incident during a second cop-suspect chase scene. An unknowing onlooker grabbed the shoulder of a cinematic villain but was restrained before anyone was injured.

“They got some tough people on Olvera Street,” Armus said.

“I like ‘em!”

The line on Zsa Zsa: Las Vegas says the odds are 3-1 against her being sent to the hoosegow.

Gene Maday, owner of Little Caesars Race and Sports Book, based his forecast on Gabor’s age (sixty-something) and the relatively minor nature of her offenses.

Maday posted the odds for “informational purposes only” since Nevada law forbids sports books from posting lines on non-sporting events. Cop-slapping is not considered a sport, even in Nevada.

Meanwhile, Zsa Zsa announced she’s auctioning off one of her two Rolls-Royces--a blue Silver Spur, not to be confused with the notorious white Corniche that she was piloting when a Beverly Hills cop stopped her for expired license tags.

“We know the registration is current on this one,” commented Drew Donen of Spectrum Auctions.

You may recall the other day that a La Canada Flintridge councilman proposed that his city inaugurate an Astronauts Walk of Fame. Councilman Chris Valente feels that La Canada Flintridge’s role in the U.S. space effort has been ignored because most newspapers routinely place the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena. Actually, part of JPL is in LCF.

Valente’s proposal was turned down but he says he won’t give up.

While he’s at it, the councilman might as well lay claim to the memorial fountain honoring Flintridge’s founder and namesake, the late U.S. Sen. Frank P. Flint.

The 56-year-old sculpture stands on the south lawn of City Hall--Los Angeles’ City Hall.

It’s long been a puzzlement to passers-by since, other than his name and birth-death dates (1862-1929), the fountain offers no explanation of who he was. It apparently didn’t seem necessary in 1933.

Los Angeles won’t even run water in the Flint fountain anymore. It was turned off three decades ago after a drunken transient fell in one night and drowned.