The Onion Field

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The Onion Field is a book by Joseph Wambaugh, a sergeant for the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) during the 1960s riots, published in 1974, regarding the March 9, 1963 kidnapping of two LAPD officers by two criminals, pulled over for a routine traffic violation. Ian James Campbell [1] and Karl Hettinger noticed a broken tail light on the car Jimmy Lee Smith (aka "Jimmy Youngblood") and Gregory Ulas Powell were driving.

Fresh from a string of robberies, Powell (who was driving) pulled a gun on Campbell and forced Hettinger to give up his gun to Smith. The two officers were then forced into Powell's car and driven to an onion field around Bakersfield where Campbell was shot and killed. The killing occurred primarily because Powell assumed that the kidnapping of the officers alone constituted a capital crime under the state's Little Lindbergh Law. However, Powell's interpretation was mistaken, as under the Little Lindbergh Law kidnapping only becomes a capital crime if the victims are harmed or the kidnappers try to ransom them.

[edit] Aftermath

Hettinger was able to escape, but later became scorned by his fellow officers, fired from the force, and eventually a police training video was made using his experience as example of what not to do when stopping and approaching a vehicle. Hettinger suffered severe emotional trauma as a result and people who knew him said he was never the same afterwards. He was forced to resign from the LAPD after committing some acts of petty shoplifting and developed a serious drinking problem. Later in life, Hettinger was appointed to serve as a county supervisor and died of a liver disease in 1994. The book details these events, as well as the lengthy trials and continual appeals of the two criminals. Powell has never been released from state prison; however, Smith was initially paroled in 1982, but has subsequently been recommitted to prison several times on drug related parole violations.