Crime review 2013: Glendale police experience a unique year
Though all years have their share of oddness, 2013 seemed bit more fruitful than most in the Jewel City. From rockers fleeing through the streets, to cremains being stolen from a minivan, to a Cadillac landing on a roof, Glendale’s strange side kept its finest more than a little busy.
Goth rocker Peter Murphy arrested
Bauhaus fans flipped this year after British Goth rock icon Peter Murphy, the band’s front man, was arrested for crashing a car in Glendale and fleeing in a Subaru Forester.
Murphy, best known as the lead vocalist in Bauhaus, pleaded no contest in October to hit-and-run driving, and guilty to a charge of possessing methamphetamine in connection to the March 16 crash.
While driving his manager’s car, he crashed into another car and fled onto the Ventura (134) Freeway.
But he didn’t get far because a truck driver witnessed the crash and followed him to the 3400 block of Barham Boulevard in Los Angeles, where he was ultimately arrested.
Police reportedly found methamphetamine inside the patrol car in which Murphy was detained.
Murphy’s guilty plea to the meth charge could be dropped and completely removed from his criminal record if he successfully completes 45 days of Narcotics Anonymous meetings. He also agreed to three random drug tests.
Murphy, who lives in Turkey with his family, is scheduled to return to court on May 8 to prove he completed the program.
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Woman sells bogus Disneyland tickets on Craigslist to families
Hollywood resident Alisa Yenokyan had several run-ins with police over the past year, but her most notable arrest was for selling bogus $50 Disneyland e-tickets to at least a half dozen families via Craigslist.
Yenokyan had been selling the altered passes to families — many of whom didn’t discover the fakery until being turned away at the park’s gates — for several years.
She claimed she bought the tickets from an unknown man and made copies of them to resell on Craigslist because “she can’t find a job and needed money to survive,” police said.
Yenokyan was convicted of seven felony counts of forgery and one felony count of grand theft for the scheme.
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Grandmother’s ashes stolen from family car
A Glendale family desperately sought their deceased family member’s ashes, which burglars stole from their minivan in October.
But what family members didn’t know is that a gardener in Burbank had already recovered the urn and turned it over to police, which happened to be the same day they reported the theft.
The urn contained ashes of the family’s matriarch, 87-year-old Burbank resident Lois LaRocco, who died Aug. 28 due to complications from Alzheimer’s. She was cremated and her ashes were placed in an 8-inch-by-11-inch round navy blue leather urn.
The urn and ashes were untouched and returned to the family.
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Woman stabs her Shiba Inu dog
A Glendale woman was sentenced for allegedly stabbing her Shiba Inu dog multiple times around its eyes while she was high on cough syrup.
Merry Jane Clift was sentenced in January to jail, banned from owning any pets while she served three years of probation and was required to complete 30 days of community service and psychological counseling for animal cruelty.
Her dog, “Huckleberry,” was also taken away from Clift and given to a relative.
Police said Clift used a 10-inch blade to stab Huckleberry around its eyes Dec. 28 inside her apartment in the 100 block of Carr Drive, police said.
A neighbor told police Clift was banging on her apartment door and begging residents to kill her, according to Glendale police.
When police arrived, they noticed a trail of blood to Clift’s apartment. Then the small brown dog stumbled up a set of stairs and stopped in front of the officers, who noticed several deep cuts on its face.
There they allegedly found a bloodied kitchen knife with a 10-inch blade and blood throughout the apartment.
Clift allegedly told officers that she had slept only two hours that night when she woke up and began stabbing her dog in the face with the knife.
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Cadillac lands on home roof
What goes up must come down.
That was the case in March when public safety crews had to use a crane to remove a 2012 Cadillac, which somehow ended up atop a home in Glendale.
No one was seriously injured when the 66-year-old Glendale driver’s car landed at about 5:43 p.m. on the home’s roof in the 400 block of Audraine Drive.
Police received a call from the driver via OnStar — a security and navigation system found in some vehicles — regarding the collision.
Investigators were looking into whether he accidentally accelerated, was driving too fast for road conditions or his brakes failed, which he allegedly claimed happened.
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Follow Veronica Rocha on Google+ and on Twitter: @VeronicaRochaLA.
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