Researching the Hazel Glab case exposed us, as we mentioned in that post, to newspaper illustrations, which in turn led us to some crime scene photo diagrams. These images were used by police, lawyers and jurors to understand the geography of crime scenes and the physics of the events. We were fascinated by the images, and when an online forum pointed us toward the Los Angeles Public Library’s online collection, we headed over there and dug into the archive. We’ve shared our finds below, with details about each crime.

Body found in L.A. River, 1949.

Girl found stabbed to death 26 December, 1936, at 721 Turner Street, with an X marking the location of her body and arrows marking the direction a car arrived and departed.

Armed robbery, 11 August, 1930, on East Pico in Los Angeles.

Armed robbery at Grauman’s Chinese Theater, with $15,000 stolen and a police officer wounded, 16 July, 1929.

This shows the crime scene after the attempted killing of gangster Mickey Cohen, with bullet holes in a parked car across the street from where Cohen was standing, 20 July, 1949.

Photo of a boy pointing to where his friend was sucked into a storm drain. The friend drowned, 1953.

1936 photo diagram showing the last movements of actress Thelma Todd, who was found dead in her car in December 1935.

Unknown and undated crime scene photo with drawing of presumed positions of assailant and victim.