A. Bookston, 83; Jeweler, Sometime Actor Fought Crime

Alexander Bookston, a jewelry store owner whose business was robbed so often that he sponsored an initiative to extend prison sentences for thieves, has died. He was 83.

Bookston, also a character actor and World War II veteran, died Jan. 21 of a brain tumor at a convalescent hospital in Granada Hills, his family said.

After his Bookston Jewelers in Granada Hills was hit by seven burglaries and armed robberies in three years, with one assailant sticking a .357 magnum into his neck, the Army Air Forces veteran decided to do something.

Bookston launched a drive to qualify an initiative for the June 1982 ballot that would eliminate any possibility of probation or suspended sentences for those convicted of armed robbery or burglary or of attempted armed robbery or burglary. The measure also would have significantly lengthened -- in some cases doubled -- the sentences imposed, ranging from a minimum five years for attempted robbery to 20 years for certain armed holdups.

In the initiative he wrote, Bookston included an edict that “the legislature may not lessen or decrease the terms of punishment.”

“I’m not a fan of the Legislature,” he told The Times when he was working on his drive for signatures in 1981. “They do nothing. They just hem and haw and play little games up there and worry about the next election.”

Bookston inspired widespread support from law enforcement, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors and Los Angeles City Council, but could not gather enough signatures to place the measure on the ballot.

The jeweler, who had operated his store since moving to the San Fernando Valley in 1948, retired and closed Bookston Jewelers in 1986.

Born in Brooklyn to Russian Jewish immigrants, Bookston was 23 when he was drafted during World War II. Although he had faced discrimination at home -- he had to pretend he was Presbyterian to obtain his job for a New York corporation -- he was more concerned about the persecution of Jews in fascist Europe.

“I was a Jewish boy in Brooklyn,” the self-declared patriot told The Times in 2000. “I knew I had to fight in this war.”

Bookston served as a radio operator, fighting in five major battles during a 22-month campaign through Italy, France, Germany and Corsica. But at war’s end, he was so worn out with the fighting and so bitter about the discrimination against Jews within the military -- he was rejected for Officer Candidate School because of his religion -- that he declined to accept any earned medals when he was discharged Oct. 14, 1945.

“I never [cared] what they thought of me these 50 years,” he told The Times more than two years ago. “I left all the heroes over there, 6 feet underground.”

Bookston relented on accepting decorations only after a granddaughter saw the film “Saving Private Ryan” and began quizzing him about his own experiences in the war he never discussed. “Not for pride, but for posterity,” he said, as he pinned on the military service medals, some 55 years late, presented by Rep. Howard Berman (D-Mission Hills) on Veterans Day 2000 at Mission College in Sylmar.

The former corporal said at the event that he was proud that World War II had helped America confront its own prejudices, commenting, “This is a different country now.”

After arriving in California after the war, Bookston found steady jobs in acting to supplement profits from his jewelry store. Over the years, billed as Alex Bookston, he appeared in several commercials, small theater, films and in such television series as “Perry Mason,” “Dennis the Menace,” “The Untouchables,” “77 Sunset Strip” and “Mission: Impossible.”

Bookston is survived by his wife, Ruth; son, Bill, of Calabasas; two daughters, Barbara Wyman of Venice, and Megan Nelson of Agoura Hills; four grandchildren; and five great-grandchildren.

The family has asked that any memorial contributions be made to the American Cancer Society or UCLA Medical Center.