The Darkest Glare: A True Story of Murder, Blackmail, and Real Estate Greed in 1979 Los Angeles

By Chip Jacobs

Book Overview

In 1979 the City of Angels had its fair share of devils. Howard Garrett was one of them. His contractor's license bought him an entr e into Space Matters, a real estate development company run out of a hip mansion on the edge of LA's Miracle Mile district. The company's owners, debonair, slick-talking Richard Kasparov and self-conscious, nerdy Jerry Schneiderman, were LA's Young Turks of interior architecture.

When Richard interviewed the quiet, buzzard-faced Howard, he figured he'd found the perfect supervisor to oversee construction for a firm hungry to expand. What neither he nor his partner Jerry knew was that by hiring Howard, they'd unloosed a monster into their midst. In The Darkest Glare: A True Story of Murder, Blackmail and Real Estate Greed in 1979 Los Angeles, author and journalist Chip Jacobs recounts a spectacular, noir true-crime saga from one of the most murderous times in American history.

It's 1979 and the Los Angeles murder rate is the highest in recorded history. Even before Howard Garrett entered Richard and Jerry's lives, he had managed to slither away from a series of brutal crimes unprosecuted.

But if Howard was the violent one of the trio, Richard was its resident grifter. As the firm expanded, Richard figured out ways to bleed the company dry for his own gain, including by hitting up Howard to put up his credit line in service of the company. When Richard's grift is exposed, Jerry cuts all ties to him while a--by now--enraged Howard loses everything. Using his steel blue El Camino to stalk his victims, Howard unleashes his blood thirsty vengeance and decides to create a murder-for-hire corporation employing a motley crew of junkies and bottom-scrapers. The first targets: the owners of Space Matters.

But Howard's band of would be assassins bungled through his scheme, while Jerry finds himself in an odyssey of disguises, getting not-so-legal, legal advice from his lawyer while surreptitiously meeting in a graveyard, seeking protection from a charismatic, ex-Israeli mercenary, and being used as bait in a LAPD-orchestrated showdown at the La Brea Tar Pits.

Whether its stumblebum killers or a mass murder averted by a kid watching Laverne & Shirley, you'll never read about bloodlust like this. Or see Southern California the same way.

Chip Jacobs conducted hundreds of hours of interviews and reviewed thousands of pages in Howard Garrett's case to connect the dots. The resulting book is a feast for true crime lovers as well as for lovers of Los Angeles noir. The Darkest Glare is vintage true crime at its finest.

As a bonus, The Darkest Glare includes an original true crime short also by Chip Jacobs, "Paul & Chuck". "Paul & Chuck" is the truly terrifying and weird story of crusading Los Angeles attorney Paul Morantz who in the late 1970s went to battle against one of the most dangerous and violent cults America has ever seen: Synanon. It's story that's guaranteed to make your skin crawl

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1644281910
• ISBN13: 9781644281918
• Release Date: March 2021
• Publisher: Rare Bird Books
• Length: 336 Pages
• Weight: 1.00 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 5.5" x 8.4"

Customer Reviews

Really wild story!

Well this story was totally crazy! Especially since all that happened in it was real, though pretty long ago! The author did a good job of adding all the details (though he did mention in the afterword that he did change some names and descriptions to protect those who had been affected by that crazy year) while still making it a very interesting read. It is amazing what lengths a person like Howard will go to when he thinks he has been wronged (not to mention his prior history of what he did to people who got on his bad side). Howard was definitely a poison that hurt many people when he set his revenge/murder plans into action. I would most definitely not want a guy like him after me! I must admit though, it was kind of funny to read about the foiled attempts at killing Richard. And I really felt sorry for Jerry, who was duped/blackmailed by both Richard and Howard and how that changed the rest of his life.