Johnny Lewis Crime Scene: The Attack, Victim, and Warnings

The Johnny Lewis crime scene at 3605 Lowry Road in Los Feliz, discovered by LAPD officers on the morning of September 26, 2012, held two bodies: the 28-year-old Sons of Anarchy actor dead in the driveway after a fall from an elevated terrace, and his 81-year-old landlady, Catherine Davis, beaten and strangled inside the ransacked Spanish-style home. A dead cat was found in the house. Two neighbors next door had been badly beaten. Toxicology would later come back clean.

What Police Found That Morning

Officers arrived at the 3600 block of Lowry Road at approximately 10:40 a.m. after neighbors called to report a screaming woman and men fighting.¹ Lewis’s body lay in the driveway of the three-story house. LAPD Commander Andrew Smith said Lewis “appeared to have died from some type of fall, either from the stairway, or from the balcony, or from one of the roofs.”²

Inside the residence, officers found Catherine Davis dead from what Smith described as “major trauma.”² The autopsy later confirmed she died from blunt-force trauma to the head and manual strangulation. Glass was shattered throughout the home. It had been ransacked. A dead cat was found inside.³ Police said Lewis had beaten both Davis and the cat to death.⁴

The Attack on the Neighbors

The violence did not stay inside the villa. According to a Los Angeles Times account, Lewis approached a neighbor on the adjoining property about fifteen minutes before the assault, introduced himself as “John,” and left. He came back, jumped a front-yard fence, and started beating a painter who was working in the yard. The homeowner’s wife saw it and screamed. Her husband ran out to help. All three of them struggled with Lewis and could not stop him. Hitting Lewis, the neighbor said, was like “hitting him with a fly swatter.”⁵ They retreated into the house and barricaded the door with their bodies while he tried to force his way in.⁶

Police said the painter and the homeowner were both badly beaten.² Lewis’s apparent imperviousness to pain became one of the recurring details in witness accounts.

How Lewis Died

The coroner’s office released Lewis’s autopsy on November 29, 2012, and ruled the death accidental. The cause was traumatic injuries from a fall. Lead investigator Jerry McKibben concluded that Lewis “appears to have jumped from an elevated terrace to the driveway while attempting to flee the scene” and that during the approximately fifteen-foot drop he lost his balance or struck an object, causing his head to hit the concrete.⁷ The coroner also noted nail marks on both sides of his neck and signs of “partial strangulation,” indicating a struggle before the fall.⁸

Senior Deputy Medical Examiner James K. Ribe said: “We do not have definitive evidence that the decedent intended to kill himself. We also do not at this time have any evidence that he was pushed. Therefore, the manner of his death is accidental.”⁷

Early speculation had focused on a synthetic hallucinogen called 2C-I, known on the street as “Smiles.” Commander Andrew Smith initially said the Los Angeles area had seen a rise in overdoses tied to the drug and that Lewis’s behavior was “consistent” with it.⁹ The toxicology results said otherwise. Testing was negative for cocaine, marijuana, hallucinogens, anti-psychotics, and prescription drugs. Lewis had no drugs or alcohol in his system.⁸

The Woman He Killed, and Why He Was in the House

Catherine Davis, known to tenants as “Miss Cathy,” was a Texan who moved to California in 1950, attended UCLA, worked in publishing, and built a career as a real estate broker. She had turned her 1927 Spanish-style mansion on Lowry Road into a boarding house for aspiring actors, writers, and musicians, charging between $1,650 and $3,000 a month.¹⁰ Former tenants and guests at what she called the Writers’ Villa included Val Kilmer, Parker Posey, Thomas Jane, Paula Poundstone, Chris Parnell, and Taylor Negron, with George Clooney among the visitors. Negron described her as a generous host who catered meals from local restaurants and hosted long dinners for artists “in artistic transit or retreat.”¹¹

Lewis had rented the villa’s second-floor “Red Suite” for two months in 2009. When he was released from Los Angeles County jail on September 21, 2012, his father suggested he return there to recover in a peaceful setting. Davis made the old room available. Lewis moved back in on Monday, September 24.¹⁰ Two days later she was dead.

The Warnings That Preceded September 26

The morning of the killings was not isolated. In the nine months before, Lewis had cycled through arrests for battery, residential burglary, and felony assault with a deadly weapon, pleading no contest in August to one count of assault and to attempted burglary. He was sentenced to a year in county jail and released five days before his death.² In a January 2012 attack in Northridge, one of the victims later said he struck Lewis in the head “many times” but Lewis “didn’t even blink.”⁶

Probation officials had flagged him in writing. A May 17, 2012, report stated that Lewis “suffers from some form of chemical dependency, mental health issue and a lack of permanent housing” and “will continue to be a threat to any community he may reside.”³ Two months earlier a probation officer had written, “Obviously defendant’s behavior is out of control and needs counseling afforded by a professional.”¹² Officials described “grave concerns” for his mental health and for the community.

His attorney, Jonathan Mandel, said Lewis had “serious mental issues that seemed to surface fairly recently” and had declined recommended treatment. Mandel described a “dual diagnosis” of “chemical addiction and chemically induced psychosis.”¹³ Alternative sentencing specialist Wendy Feldman said Lewis was dealing with “psychopathy or bipolar disorder” and that there was an “obvious need for a medical therapeutic approach” that was “not being treated.”¹⁴

Lewis’s father, Michael Lewis, believed his son had suffered a traumatic brain injury, though Lewis “had yet to receive a clear diagnosis” of whether he was “bipolar, psychotic, or suffering from traumatic brain injury.” In January 2012, after a violent incident involving blunt head trauma, Lewis was placed on a psychiatric hold; his discharge summary read, “Chief Complaint: Blunt Head Trauma and Suicidal.”¹⁰ He was prescribed Zyprexa and Abilify but resisted taking them, and reportedly stopped Abilify by June 2012 because he “couldn’t afford it anymore.”¹⁴

On May 23, 2012, a judge ordered Lewis into an outpatient program at Ridgeview Ranch in Altadena, a dual-diagnosis facility treating psychosis and substance abuse. His father said Lewis resisted his medications and may have “cheeked” them rather than swallowing.¹⁰ Lewis then fired Mandel, represented himself, and pleaded no contest, choosing jail time over continued treatment. Mandel said Lewis “didn’t want to stay in treatment.”¹³ He finished his sentence at Twin Towers Correctional Facility and was released on September 21. Five days later, a 10:40 a.m. call brought LAPD to Lowry Road.

Sons of Anarchy creator Kurt Sutter said after the deaths: “I wish I could say that I was shocked by the events last night, but I was not. I am deeply sorry that an innocent life had to be thrown into his destructive path.”¹ Actress Shannon Woodward, a close friend of Lewis, wrote on Twitter: “Johnny Lewis was one of my best friends. He was very, very ill. His actions were a despicable result of that.”¹⁰

1
LA Times Homicide Report. Catherine Chabot Davis
2
ABC News. Sons of Anarchy Actor Johnny Lewis in Jail Days Before Death
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CBS News. Johnny Lewis on a Destructive Path Before Violent End
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6ABC. Actor Johnny Lewis Crime Scene
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Los Angeles Times. Lewis Attacked Neighbors in Los Feliz
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NBC News Today. Sons of Anarchy Actor Johnny Lewis Attacked Other Neighbors Before His Death
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E! News. Sons of Anarchy Death: Johnny Lewis Fall Ruled Accidental
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CBS News. Johnny Lewis Not on Drugs When He Allegedly Killed Landlady
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ABC News. Street Drug Smiles Implicated in Johnny Lewis Death
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Los Angeles Magazine. The Secret Life of Johnny Lewis
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Deadline. Murdered Landlady and Her Writers Villa Was Hollywood Legend to Actors
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CBS News. Johnny Lewis Actor Reportedly Had Mental Health Problems
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People. Johnny Lewis Called Threat to Community Before He Killed a Woman
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E! News. Johnny Lewis Was Dealing With Psychopathy or Bipolar Disorder