Clerical errors and luck kept suspect in Lily Burk killing on the street, records show

Three years before he was charged with kidnapping and murdering 17-year-old Lily Burk, Charles Samuel slipped through an unlocked side door of a Van Nuys home.
The man living there, James Alger, was dating Samuel's ex-wife, according to court records newly obtained by The Times. As he spotted Samuel in his home, Alger confronted the intruder, asking why he had entered the house.
"I can do whatever . . . I want," Samuel responded.
Samuel punched Alger two or three times in the face, leaving the victim bruised before Samuel snatched a cordless phone and keys and fled, according to a probation report released to The Times in response to an order from a court of appeals.
The report gives the clearest picture yet of the criminal record and recent biography of the man accused in the abduction and slaying of Burk, a high school student whose killing this summer jolted a city inured to news of violence.
Read the full story here.-- Jack Leonard
Photo: Los Angeles Times
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