What Happened on July 27th

In an article in the Los Angeles Times, former San Jose Police Chief Joseph McNamara argued that computers could have saved fashion designer Gianni Versace, murdered earlier that summer by Andrew Cunanan. "If the Miami Beach Police Department had computer technology as sophisticated as that used in one of the town's trendy restaurants," McNamara wrote, "fashion designer Gianni Versace would probably still be alive." He noted, however, that few police departments have the necessary technology. Police had received information on Cunanan earlier in the week from a pawnbroker, but at the time of Versace's death, it remained in paper format waiting to be entered into the computer system.