By Daily Press Staff

DOWNTOWN, LA The murder trial for a pair of silver-haired septuagenarians accused of killing two homeless men in an insurance scam will finally commence today, nearly two years after they were arrested.

Among the defendants is Helen Golay, a former Santa Monica resident who owned at least three apartment buildings in the Ocean Park neighborhood. Golay, who celebrated her 77th birthday in February, will be reunited with her co-defendant, Olga Rutterschmidt of Hollywood, who turned 75 earlier this month.

The women stand accused of murdering Paul Vados and Kenneth McDavid in separate yet similar hit-and-run incidents in 1999 and 2005, respectively. Prosecutors allege that the two elderly women befriended the victims when they were still homeless, setting them up with apartments and later convincing them to sign the women onto their insurance policies before the men were mysteriously killed.

A three-woman, nine-man juror panel was sworn in last Thursday after. All parties are due back into court for opening statements this morning.

The case has moved slowly since the women were arrested in May 2006 as the public defender for Rutterschmidt changed hands from Kim Savo to Michael Sklar, who, after taking over later last year, asked the judge for more time to review the circumstances. Both attorneys also sought motions to dismiss the trial.

The women were initially arrested on federal mail fraud charges, which were dropped shortly after murder charges were filed in late July 2006.

Once the owner of three apartment complexes in Santa Monica, including a pink building on Ocean Park Boulevard in which she lived, Golay and Rutterschmidt, a Hungarian immigrant, are believed to have taken out several life insurance policies on the two victims and ultimately collected more than $1 million in their deaths.

During pre-trial hearings in March of last year, investigators revealed a series of insurance applications and claim forms showing the women claiming various relationships with the two men, including fiancés, cousins and business partners. Relatives of the two men who testified during the preliminary hearing stated that they had no knowledge of being related to Golay or Rutterschmidt.

Prosecutors also claimed that Golay’s AAA membership was used to tow a vehicle just blocks from where McDavid was believed to have been killed in a Westwood alley. The tow truck driver testified during the hearing last year, stating he recalled dropping off a person about a block from where Golay lived in Santa Monica. Vados was killed in an alley in Hollywood.

The unusual nature of the case has garnered national attention, mainly because of the age of the defendants. A movie loosely based on the events, titled “Poor Things,” starring Rosario Dawson and Shirley MacLaine was also believed to be in the works, though there were talks last year that production had ceased because of legal issues surrounding one of the castmates, Lindsay Lohan.

Prosecutors announced last year that they do not intend to seek the death penalty against the women.

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