It's Burke's Law

Category: Obituary/News

You just cannot beat a plot like this: a millionaire L.A. police homicide captain who's a playboy gets chauffeured to the scene of every crime in a Rolls. That was Burke's Law, the intelligent and extremely funny series that aired in the early 1960s. Gene Barry played Amos Burke, the captain who usually found his date interrupted by a phone call from one of his detectives, asking him to come to the scene of a murder. Every episode's title began "Who Killed..." Sometimes the answer was obvious; other times it was a total surprise.

Gene Barry died December 9 at a retirement home, apparently of natural causes.

Barry played many other roles in his life -- Bat Masterson, Glenn Howard in The Name of the Game, and Gene Talbot in Our Miss Brooks. But there was nothing like Amos Burke -- not before, not since.

Gene Barry was 90.