Sentence brings bit of peace

Deepa Bharath

For three months, Darleen Savoji didn’t know day from night.

The Newport Crest resident spearheaded a grass-roots movement in

the neighborhood in 1997 to evict James Lee Crummel, a sex offender

whose rap sheet would send shivers down any parent’s spine.

On Friday, a Riverside County judge handed Crummel, 60, a death

sentence for kidnapping, sexually assaulting and murdering

13-year-old Jamey Trotter, who was last seen on April 19, 1979,

walking on Harbor Boulevard in Costa Mesa toward Gisler Middle

School.

The blond boy was reported missing and feared dead when

investigators couldn’t solve the case. Eleven years later, in 1990,

Crummel led Riverside County sheriff’s deputies to the boy’s charred

skeletal remains in a remote, burned-out area near the Ortega

Highway.

In 1997, a year after Megan’s Law was passed in California,

Crummel’s whereabouts as a “high-risk sex offender” were made known

to the community.

Newport Beach police passed out information about Crummel in the

neighborhood. Savoji’s sons, then 13 and 7, immediately identified

the face on the flier as the man who had invited them into the house

Crummel shared with psychiatrist Burnell Forgey. He had suggested to

the boys, who were riding BMX bikes, that they go in, have a Coke and

watch BMX movies. The children declined the offer.

But that was enough to set off their mom and most of the neighbors

who joined hands with Savoji and protested every chance they got.

They picketed outside Crummel’s condo, Forgey’s office and even the

real estate office of Forgey’s son.

Savoji’s crusade paid off. Crummel was arrested in 1997 for

molesting a 16-year-old boy in his condo. He was later convicted of

the crime and sentenced to 60 years to life in prison. Forgey was

also convicted for molesting the teen and was in jail for a few

years.

Family members said Forgey died in November 2001 in San Bernardino

County of complications from pneumonia. He was 83.

Savoji reacted with shock on Monday when she heard about Crummel’s

death sentence for the first time.

“I really didn’t expect it,” she said. “I didn’t think the system

would come though like that.”

It’s emotional for Savoji because she has also known the Trotter

family for a long time, she said. They became close during the three

months when it became her “business” to get Crummel out of the

neighborhood, Savoji said.

“I was passionate about it, as were 60 to 80 other people,” she

said.

But for all that, Savoji said she hopes Crummel’s life ends before

he gets the lethal injection.

“I’m still a woman,” she said. “The fact that he will never be out

in the streets ever again is good enough for me.”

Prosecutor Bill Mitchell laid out the facts about Crummel’s

history with sex abuse before jurors. He pointed out that Crummel’s

obsession with molesting young boys began as early as 1962, when he

was a private in the U.S. Army. He was then accused of luring two

young boys to a hill, where he performed sexual acts on them. Crummel

was tried in military court, convicted and spent four years in

prison.

In 1967, in Wisconsin, Crummel picked up a 14-year-old boy

hitchhiking, took him to the woods near Lake Michigan, sexually

abused him, then hit him on the head with a tree branch and left him

to die in a ravine. But the boy lived to tell the story. Crummel was

convicted again and went to prison but was released in the mid-1970s

on parole.

Throughout the trial, however, Crummel maintained his innocence.

His attorney, Public Defender Mary Ann Galante, said her client’s

past had a lot to do with his conviction and resultant death

sentence.

“The priors clearly had an impact on the verdict and the penalty,”

she said.

She could see that Jamey’s family is bitter about Crummel, Galante

said.

“They want him to feel remorse,” she said. “But how can he feel

remorse for something he hasn’t done?”

The case will be automatically appealed, Galante said. She expects

it to take at least five to eight years to find a lawyer to represent

Crummel for the appeal. It would take longer for the process to be

completed, she said.

During the sentencing on Friday, Jamey’s brother, Jeff Trotter,

asked Crummel to come clean about other children he may have harmed

so their parents could get closure.

Crummel did not respond.

Costa Mesa Police Det. Paul Cappuccilli, who sat through Trotter’s

speech, said he felt the same way.

“Crummel is going to be in jail anyway,” he said. “If he talks

about the other kids, at least those families will get some peace.”

Cappuccilli, a retired cop who is now a Costa Mesa police reserve

officer working on cold cases, took over the “missing person” case a

year after Jamey disappeared.

Clueless, but not hopeless, Cappuccilli monitored reports from all

over the country, sending out Jamey’s dental records every time

remains of a child his age were found. And every time, he called

Jamey’s mother, Barbara Trotter Brogli, to tell her it wasn’t her

boy.

“But that case had no reason to be closed,” he said. “I kept it

active and very much alive.”

And then, in 1996, something that Cappuccilli can only describe as

“weird” happened. He heard that bones, found in 1990, had just been

identified as Jamey’s. Within the same year, Cappuccilli had a chance

meeting with the man who had eluded him for so long. Then a patrol

officer, he stopped Crummel in Costa Mesa for not having his vehicle

registration. As Cappuccilli was writing the ticket, the two talked.

“I asked him, ‘Don’t I know you from somewhere,’ and he said

‘No,’” Cappuccilli said. “And then he asked me if I was on TV. And I

said I was interviewed about Jamey’s case.”

And then Crummel told Cappuccilli that he was the one who found

Jamey’s bones.

Something didn’t add up for Cappuccilli. He went back to the

department and pulled up Crummel’s rap sheet. Then, it all came

together. Cappuccilli had arrested Crummel in Costa Mesa in the

1980s. He sent the information to Riverside County sheriff’s

officials, who didn’t even do a background check because they thought

Crummel was merely an informant, Cappuccilli said.

Cappuccilli asked himself many times over the years why Crummel

would lead officials to the grave of someone he killed.

“I’m no psychiatrist,” he said. “Maybe he did it for the

notoriety. Or maybe he wanted to throw law-enforcement officials a

crumb as if to tell them, ‘Here, come and get me.’”

For all the grief it has caused the family, Cappuccilli said he is

pleased with the way it all ended.

“Personally, it was an emotional experience for me to be at the

sentencing,” he said. “I am very happy for the Trotters. I’m very

sorry Jamey died, but glad that we got a very violent predator off

the street.”