Steve Hodel

STEVE HODEL was born and raised in Los Angeles, Calif. After serving four years as a medic in the Navy, he joined the Los Angeles Police Dept. in 1963. After six years in uniform patrol, he transferred to Hollywood division detectives where he worked all of the "tables"; burglary, robbery, auto theft, juvenile, crimes against persons and then homicide detail.

During his career at Hollywood Homicide, Steve promoted to Detective II, and in 1983, he was the senior field homicide detective. Steve handled over 300 separate murder investigations and had one of the department's highest solved rates. He promoted to Detective III (the highest attainable rank in detectives) and retired from LAPD in 1986, and moved to Bellingham, Wash.


Hodel Investigations HODEL INVESTIGATIONS was established in 1986, and Steve is a licensed Private Investigator in both California and Washington. He has conducted mainly criminal defense investigations in both states and worked over six years as lead investigator on a high-profile international murder case which resulted in an innocent man being released from prison in Tokyo, Japan, after five years of detention.

In 2001, after two years of full-time investigation on the Elizabeth Short (Black Dahlia) and related serial killings, Steve relocated to his home town of Hollywood to complete the investigation. He now resides full time in the Los Angeles area.