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Police said today that they took transient Charlie Samuel into custody by 5:30 p.m. Friday on drug charges in Downtown. They now have a pretty horrific chronology of the events that led to Burk being found dead in her Volvo; Samuel was apparently spotted getting out of the car's driver-side door at 4:52 p.m. outside 458 Alameda. Police believe Burk was abducted about 3 p.m. from outside Southwestern University Law School, located in the former Bullock's Wilshire store on Wilshire in Koreatown. Samuel had been released from state prison in February and was arrested April 23 on a parole violation, then enrolled in a drug program.
Nick Goldberg, the deputy editor of the editorial pages at the L.A. Times, and former Times Magazine editor Rick Wartzman appeared as spokesmen for the Burk family at the LAPD news conference.
* Afternoon updates:
- Southwestern is holding a candlelight vigil at 8 p.m. outside the parking lot entrance on Wilshire Place.
- Celeste Fremon at Witness LA fills out the chronology.
- Zach Behrens at LAist Google-maps the locations.
- L.A. Homicide #175, teenager found murdered Downtown LA Weekly
- Ed Fuentes at Downtown LA puts the suspect's arrest in the context of downtown policing tactics.
- The Police Protective League blogs the the killing is "an unfortunate and horribly tragic example of why the LAPPL has vehemently opposed the early release of prisoners and minimizing the seriousness of parole violations as a means of reducing the state budget deficit."
Previously:
Arrest in Lily Burk killing