page_title: Johnny Stompanato homicide
section_title: Homicide
hierarchical_section_title: Johnny Stompanato homicide / Homicide
caption_attribution_description: English: Former home of actress Lana Turner at 730 N. Bedford Drive, Beverly Hills, California. Location of death of Turner's lover, Johnny Stompanato.
context_page_description: On the evening of April 4, 1958, 14-year-old Cheryl Crane stabbed 32-year-old Johnny Stompanato, the boyfriend of her mother, actress Lana Turner, at Turner's rented home in Beverly Hills, California. Stompanato, an ex-Marine and affiliate of the Cohen crime family, had been in a year-long relationship with Turner which had been rocky and marked with physical abuse.
  Crane and Turner alleged that the former had stabbed Stompanato in the stomach when Turner was ushering him out of her bedroom during a violent argument. Crane had heard the fighting and took a knife from the kitchen, planning to defend her mother. After Crane turned herself in to police in the early morning hours of April 5, she was interred in a juvenile hall. A coroner's inquest was held on April 11, during which the homicide was deemed justifiable, and Crane was exonerated of any wrongdoing. She was released in late April, and placed under the guardianship of her grandmother.
  Public response to the case was divisive, and numerous press outlets published articles criticizing Turner and likened her testimony during the inquest to that of a performance.
context_section_description: At approximately 8:00 p.m. on April 4, eight days after the Academy Awards ceremony, Stompanato arrived at Turner's rented home at 730 North Bedford Drive in Beverly Hills, California, which she had just begun leasing a week prior. The two began arguing heatedly in the bedroom, during which Stompanato threatened to kill Turner, her daughter, and her mother, as well as making "gangster threats" that involved breaking Turner's bones and slashing her face with a straight razor. Her daughter, Cheryl Crane, had briefly entered the room during the argument, but was urged by Turner to leave. In the midst of the ensuing argument, Turner broke off her relationship with Stompanato, and asked him to leave the house.
  
  Fearing that Turner's life was in danger, Crane, who had been watching television in an adjacent room, grabbed a kitchen knife and ran to her mother's defense. Crane recalled the incident in 2012: 
  There's a knife on the counter. I picked it up ran back up the stairs. Her door suddenly flies open. I see John coming toward me. He's got his hand up... I raised the knife and he walks right into it. And he looked at me. And he said, 'My God, Cheryl, what have you done?'"
   Turner corroborated this, stating that Crane, who had been listening to the couple's fight behind the closed door, stabbed Stompanato in the stomach when Turner attempted to usher him out of the bedroom. Turner initially believed Crane had punched him, but realized he had been stabbed when he collapsed and she saw blood on his shirt. Per official police accounts, Crane left the room, placing the knife on a "small marble-topped table" and rushed to phone her father, Joseph Stephen "Steve" Crane in the melee. Turner meanwhile called for a doctor, who arrived at the house shortly after; the doctor attempted to revive Stompanato with an adrenaline injection and an artificial respirator. Unable to obtain a pulse, the doctor called for emergency services, thereby notifying the police, and Stompanato was subsequently pronounced dead at the scene. 
  An autopsy conducted by Charles Langhauser shortly after revealed Stompanato's death was caused by a single knife wound that penetrated his liver, portal vein, and aorta, resulting in massive internal hemorrhaging.
caption: Turner's Beverly Hills residence, where Stompanato was killed
exif: {}