Molester Is Identified in Handbills

NEWPORT BEACH — Embracing a controversial law that allows them to publicize the whereabouts of sex criminals, police distributed 500 handbills Monday in an upscale condominium complex where a convicted child molester lives.

The fliers identify James Lee Crummel, also known as Jimmy Lee Savage, as both a resident of the Newport Crest complex and as a violent felon convicted in four states since 1962.

The fliers, which have a color photo of the 53-year-old Crummel, mark the most recent local use of Megan’s Law, which gives police the latitude to inform residents of convicted sex offenders in their midst.

Crummel is classified by the California Department of Justice as one of the state’s 1,500 “high-risk sex offenders,” a classification earned with three or more violent felony convictions, including at least one sex crime.

Eighteen Newport Beach residents currently are registered with the state as convicted sex offenders, according to Sgt. John Desmond, Newport Beach Police spokesman. Only Crummel is classified as high risk.

Crummel has been registered as a Newport Beach resident since 1995, but Desmond said he has “been in the area off and on for 15 years.” Desmond was unsure whether any of Crummel’s crimes were committed locally.

The fliers list Crummel’s convictions as multiple counts of child molestation, kidnapping and sex perversions, along with one count of aggravated assault and battery on a child. He targets boys between ages 9 and 16, the flier states.

He is described as white, with brown hair and hazel eyes, 5 feet 10 and 160 pounds. The fliers were left on doorknobs at about 5:30 p.m. in the Newport Crest complex, which is near Ticonderoga Street and Superior Avenue. By dinner time, residents were huddling together on porches and warily studying every car that drove past.

“It’s a wake-up call,” said one 33-year-old mother of two who declined to give her name. Crummel “is here, somewhere, but they don’t give us his exact address so we don’t know where. I’m not sleeping tonight.”

Another resident, Jayne Crowfoot, said she was shocked and then thankful to see the handbill.

“I have an 8-year-old grandson,” she said. “I’m grateful for the information.”

Police officials will be available at 7 p.m. Wednesday to answer questions from the community regarding the issue at a meeting in City Council Chambers.