A California death row inmate committed suicide over the weekend, officials with the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation confirmed Tuesday. The inmate has been identified as 68-year-old James Lee Crummel, who was sentenced to death for the murder of a 13-year-old boy.
Lt. Sam Robinson of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation said Crummel was found hanging in his cell at San Quentin State Prison Sunday evening around 4 o’clock. He was last seen alive by a corrections officer at 3:45 p.m. According to the Los Angeles Times, Crummel used an extension cord to hang himself from his locker. An autopsy will be performed.
Crummel was convicted in 2004 of the abduction, rape and murder of James Wilfred Trotter. Trotter disappeared while walking to school on April 13, 1979. His body was recovered in 1990 after Crummel reported finding human remains in the Santa Ana Mountains. Authorities identified the remains as those of Trotter in 1996 and charged Crummel with the boy’s murder in 1997. Crummel had also been convicted in other child molestation cases in California, Missouri, Wisconsin and Arizona.
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