Defense attorneys to meet during hearing on Friday morning
DOWNTOWN LA Inside one criminal justice center courtroom on Wednesday, a hearing was underway for the murder trial of music producer Phil Spector — a trial that began exactly one week ago for a four-year-old murder case.
A few doors down in the Clara Shortridge Foltz Criminal Justice Center, two defense attorneys, a prosecutor and one tired judge reconvened once again in an attempt to get the murder trial of Santa Monica resident Helen Golay, 76, and Olga Rutterschmidt, 74, moving. It was the first pretrial meeting for the two women, accused of murdering two homeless men — Kenneth McDavid and Paul Vados — in an alleged insurance scam to cash in on their life insurance policies.
Pointing down the hallway in the direction of the courtroom where the Spector trial was taking place, Rutterschmidt’s defense attorney, public defender Michael Sklar, indicated just how long it might be before his client’s case even goes to court.
The Spector case concerns the murder of one person — actress Lana Clarkson — in February 2003 in Spector’s Alhambra mansion, as opposed to the two victims in the Golay-Rutterschmidt case. The Spector case is not tied up by any special circumstances charges that could bring forth the death penalty, according to Sklar. Prosecutors are mulling whether to pursue the death penalty against the two elderly women.
Close to a year since their arrest on May 18, 2006 for federal mail fraud charges, Golay and Rutterschmidt likely have a long ways to go before their case goes to trial.
Investigators believe Golay, who owned three apartment buildings in Santa Monica at the time of her arrest, and Rutterschmidt, of Hollywood, concocted a scheme in which they befriended the two men when they were still homeless, setting them up in apartments and gaining their trust. The elderly duo then allegedly convinced Vados and McDavid to sign them onto their life insurance policies before they were killed in separate, yet similar, hit-and-run incidents in 1995 and 2005, respectively.
The women were ushered into the courtroom once again on Wednesday morning, donning the typical LA County orange jumpsuits.
Golay’s defense attorney, Roger Jon Diamond, informed Judge David Wesley that the tentative trial date of May 23 was unrealistic considering that he and Sklar had both filed different motions to dismiss in recent weeks.
Diamond’s motion to dismiss is based on an allegation that his client was deprived sufficient rest during the preliminary hearing because she was awoken at 3 a.m. every morning for the trip from Lynwood to Downtown LA. In his motion for Rutterschmidt, Sklar requests dismissal based on insufficient evidence against his client.
Regardless of how Judge Curtis Rappe rules on the motions during a hearing on Friday, the trial date would have to be postponed because of impending appeals by either the defense or the prosecution, Diamond said.
If the judge grants the motions, Deputy District Attorney Shellie Samuels would have the option of appealing the ruling or refiling the case. If the motions are denied, Diamond said he would fight the ruling to the Court of Appeals.
Wesley changed the original May 23 date from a trial to another pre-trial, saying he would like the case to go to trial by the end of August or beginning of September.
“At some point, I’m saying to you, ‘let’s go,’” Wesley said.
Diamond also requested that his client be excused from attending all court hearings of procedural matters, such as the pre-trial. Wesley did grant a waiver of personal presence during an arraignment in March, but denied a request that Golay be excused from appearing in the pre-trial on Wednesday. He granted the waiver for the May 23 pre-trial.
“The system is wearing her out,” Diamond pleaded.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on May 3, 2007. Read the original PDF.