Burbank Police Department (California) - Crime

Crime

Burbank's overall crime rate fell 1% during 2010, and the city made it through the year without any homicides, according to figures released by the police. That contrasts with two homicides in 2008 and one in 2009. The number of violent crimes recorded by the FBI in its preliminary Uniform Crime Reports was 91 during the first half of 2010, down from 112 in the like period a year earlier. The violent crime rate was approximately 2.34 per 1,000 people in 2009, well below the national average of 4.29 per 1,000 people as reported by the U.S. Department of Justice in the Bureau of Justice Statistics. Furthermore Burbank was named again in 2010 as One of the Nation's 100 Best Communities for Young People by America's Promise Alliance.

As of December 2011, Burbank Police began posting arrest information online for the first time. The website contains archives going back to the start of the program.

Criminal offenses are charged and locally prosecuted in the Burbank Courthouse. The Los Angeles District Attorney handles all of the felony violations which occur within Burbank city limits. The Burbank City Attorney, through its Prosecution Division, handles the remaining violations, which include all misdemeanors, and municipal code violations such as the Burbank Anti-Smoking Ordinance, as well as traffic offenses. The Burbank Superior Court is a high-volume courthouse; the City Prosecutor files approximately 5,500 cases yearly, and the Burbank Police Department directly files approximately 12,000 to 15,000 traffic citations per year. Burbank Court, Division Two, handles all of the misdemeanor arraignments for Burbank offenses. A typical arraignment calendar is between 100 and 120 cases each day, including 15 to 25 defendants who are brought to court in custody. Many cases are initiated by arrests at the Burbank (Bob Hope) Airport. Common arrests include possession of drugs such as marijuana, weapons, prohibited items, as well as false identification charges.

One of the most infamous crimes in the city took place in March 1953, when elderly widow Mabel Monahan was killed in her Burbank home. When Monahan, 64, opened the door to her house on West Parkside Avenue, she found herself confronted by a stranger, Barbara Graham (also sometimes referred to as Barbara Wood). Graham, along with some other accomplices, had heard rumors of a Las Vegas gambling fortune hidden in Monahan's house. She was discovered by a gardener, who went to her front door and looked in to find a ransacked home and a grisly trail of blood. The gardener immediately called the Burbank Police, who discovered Monahan's badly beaten body, half in and half out of a closet.

On June 3, 1955, Graham and two of her partners in crime were executed in the gas chamber at San Quentin for their part in the brutal murder of Mabel Monahan. Graham had insisted she was innocent. Actress Susan Hayward won a Best Actress Oscar for her portrayal of Graham in the 1958 classic movie I Want To Live. Prior to filming, director Robert Wise had attended an actual execution at San Quentin Prison in order to help him authentically capture his film's climactic event. In 1983, ABC Television remade the movie, casting actress Lindsay Wagner (known for her role as the Bionic Woman) as Barbara Graham.

In February 1981, serial killer Lawrence Bittaker, a Burbank machinist, was convicted of first-degree murder in the 1979 kidnapping and slaying of five teen-aged girls in a case that was the first felony trial in California to allow TV cameras into the courtroom over the objections of the defendant. As of October 2012, he was still on Death Row.

Previous to the murder of Burbank police officer Matthew Pavelka in 2003, the city experienced earlier cases of tragedy involving local law enforcement. Marshal Luther Colson and Deputy City Marshal Robert L. Normand were shot to death while patrolling the city. Their deaths in 1914 and 1920 marked the first time that Burbank police officers were killed in the line of duty. Colson was shot the evening of November 16, 1914, when he was walking on railroad tracks near what is now Victory Place and Lake Street. Six years later, Normand was killed when he responded to a call for help to check on three men in a vehicle with its lights out. The men began shooting as Normand and another officer approached the car. The other officer survived despite three bullet wounds, but Normand died at the scene. Additionally, two other Burbank officers have died on duty. They were motorcycle officers Joseph R. Wilson and Richard E. Kunkle, who were killed in separate accidents in 1961.