LOS ANGELES — A homeless man killed on Skid Row by Los Angeles police had been released in May from a federal prison after serving roughly 14 years for bank robbery, a law enforcement official said Tuesday.
The man was identified as Charley Saturmin Robinet by the official, who had been briefed but was not authorized to speak publicly about the investigation and spoke on the condition of anonymity.
Robinet was a French national convicted in 2000 of three federal charges for holding up a Wells Fargo branch and pistol-whipping an employee to pay for acting classes at the Beverly Hills Playhouse.
Robinet was killed Sunday after a confrontation with police. Authorities say he tried to grab a probationary officer’s gun and three officers fatally shot him.
The officers, some of whose actions were recorded by a bystander, were veterans of the Skid Row beat and had special training to deal with mentally ill and other people in the downtrodden area, police leaders said.
