Yesterday in El Lay, in a mostly affluent neighborhood near the planetarium and the zoo, an actor named Johnny Lewis apparently beat his 81-year-old landlady to death with a two-by-four. Her name was Catherine Davis. Lewis then jumped a fence, attacked the man who lived next door and a painter, jumped the fence again, climbed to the roof of his landlady’s house and swan-dived into a concrete driveway.
Los Angeles police refused to speculate whether Lewis was high on drugs at the time. A police spokesman named Andrew Smith did reveal that “It appears that some type of altercation occurred inside the house, resulting in the death of the woman, then this individual ran outside and had an altercation with a couple of neighbors.”
Lewis was a successful but not famous actor who was best known for portraying a prospect of the Sons of Anarchy Motorcycle Club. The MC is at the center of the eponymous television show on FX. The show is currently the most important and lucrative drama on basic cable. Lewis also had recurring roles on the television series The O.C., Quintuplets, American Dreams and Boston Public.
Half Sack
Lewis’ character on Sons of Anarchy was Kip “Half Sack” Epps who was a vegetarian and a former Junior Lightweight boxing champion. Half Sack lost one of his nuts in Iraq and worked as an auto mechanic. The character survived for 26 episodes of the show and was stabbed to death at the end of Season Two.In a blog post earlier today Kurt Sutter who is credited as the show’s creator wrote, “not sure if folks know this yet, but johnny lewis (halfsack) died last night. the sad irony of it happening two days after opie’s death is not lost on me. it was a tragic end for an extremely talented guy, who unfortunately had lost his way. 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. yes, it’s day or mourning, but it’s also a day of awareness and gratitude. sadly, some of us carry the message by dying.”
Opie
Sutter is joined by many of the show’s fans in finding “sad irony” that Lewis’ homicidal tantrum came just two days after “Opie’s death.”Harry “Opie” Winston, portrayed by actor Ryan Hurst, was an SOAMC patch holder and the son of one of the club’s founders. Hurst’s character was also beaten to death on Tuesday night’s episode of the show.
“That’s what we do on the show,” Sutter told Tierney Bricker of the E! television network yesterday. “I wanted Opie to go out a warrior, with nobility and a sense of protecting the people.”