Woman, N. Hollywood Man Held in Brentwood Slaying

A North Hollywood man and a Bell woman were arrested Wednesday on suspicion of murder in the stabbing death of a man slain during a botched carjacking attempt in the subterranean garage of his condominium complex in Brentwood earlier this month.

Lt. Ed Garcia, commander of the West Los Angeles detective division of the Los Angeles Police Department, said Gerald Singleton, 32, and Bennie Lee Kamack, 41, were taken into custody at their homes without incident Wednesday morning.

Garcia said the suspects were tied to the crime by two anonymous phone tips, by evidence at the crime scene and by credit cards stolen during the attack.

Investigators said that on the morning of May 6, Singleton and Kamack tailed 42-year-old Craig Harrington and his wife as the couple drove back to their home in the 11700 block of Montana Avenue.

When Harrington drove through the condominium security gate in his Mercedes-Benz 500SL convertible, the suspects followed in their pickup truck before the gate closed, Garcia said. Garcia said Harrington was stabbed in the chest when he tried to defend himself and his wife during the suspects’ attempts to steal his car. Harrington’s wife, who fled during the attack, was not injured.

The suspects fled without the car, but they did take the wife’s purse, police said.

In the days that followed, police received two calls identifying one of the suspects, Garcia said. He said Detectives Brad Robert and Angela Rivers began following up leads, including a piece of crumpled paper found on the garage floor that helped them identify the pickup truck.

In addition, Garcia said, one of the suspects began using credit cards taken from the stolen purse.

The lieutenant said carjacking and attempted carjackings are occurring with increasing frequency on the Westside.

“Follow-homes are not that uncommon any more,” he said. “But getting killed over one--that is uncommon.”