He didn’t exactly feel like a character...

He didn’t exactly feel like a character profiled on the “America’s Most Wanted” TV show.

But when Robert Khourey saw his photo in The Times, he knew there’d be a problem.

He had been spotlighted for catching the first fish off the newly opened section of the Santa Monica Pier on Friday.

He had also phoned in sick to school that day.

“The opening of the pier was pretty important to me,” explained Khourey, 18, who attends Newmark High. “I’ve been fishing there for a long time. You hear about kids involved in gang shootings and so on every day. This was a pretty good cause.”

Principal Kay Lachter couldn’t help laughing about the incident.

“I gave him a hard time for being truant,” she said. “But how long has it been since you’ve heard about a kid being truant for that reason? ‘Refreshing’ was the word one of the teachers used.”

A literary crime wave is sweeping the beach cities, from T. Jefferson Parker’s “Laguna Heat,” to Sue Grafton’s alphabet series (“A is for Alibi,” etc.), set in Santa Barbara.

Robert Ferrigno’s “Horse Latitudes” pays a surrealistic tribute to Long Beach’s top tourist attractions: “He wished life were more like a Japanese monster movie. Then he and Michael could sit on the bluffs, drink a few beers, and watch the Spruce Goose break out of its dome and attack the Queen Mary. BATTLE OF THE BEHEMOTHS!”

In Michael Katz’s recently released “Last Dance in Redondo Beach,” a pro wrestler dies mysteriously while paddling a raft in a network celebrities sports event.

One of Katz’s references is already outdated in these fast-changing times. A sportscaster depressed over being assigned the celebrities competition is reassured by a friend that “Brent Musberger used to do the Strongman Refrigerator Pull.”

After his axing by CBS, Brent may soon be back with the refrigerators.

Here’s a real-life crime scene, set in L.A.:

“I went into the store with a dope pusher, a punk conspicuous for his mouthful of gold teeth, and bought a packet of cocaine. Then the pusher and I dropped into the back room of a saloon, where another addict joined our party. He broke up the crystals in their paper wrapping, placed the powder neatly between his thumb and forefinger, and snuffed the cocaine up each nostril. . . .”

Sound familiar?

It was a description by the late newsman Hugh Baillie of L.A. in 1912.

John Farrell of Lomita wondered why a pig’s face is superimposed over the mug of Pirate Radio disc jockey Scott Shannon on several area billboards. So we phoned the folks at KQLZ-FM.

Was it the work of a vicious competitor? we asked.

Nope. “We did it ourselves,” said a cheery spokeswoman. “Our slogan is, ‘We’re the party pigs!’ ”

Sorry we asked.

MiscelLAny:

Everybody Out of the Water! A USC hangout named Julie’s may be the only restaurant in town that offers outdoor dining on a swimming pool. During football season, the pool is drained, boarded up and covered with tables and a green carpet. The pool, which is uncovered the rest of the year, is for decorative purposes only. It was built because the building originally was going to be a motel.