Oct 3, 2006 8:09 pm US/Pacific
Black Widows Allegedly Drugged Homeless Victim
LOS ANGELES (CBS) ―
Two women accused in the murders of two homeless men gave one victim a mix of prescription drugs and alcohol to render him unconscious when he was run over in West Los Angeles, new court papers allege.
Prescription bottles for the same drugs found in Kenneth McDavid's system -- the sleep aid Ambien and the painkiller Vicodin -- were found at the Santa Monica apartment of Helen Golay, one of two women charged with murdering McDavid and another man on whom they took out multiple life insurance policies, according to the court papers.
The allegations are part of a federal lawsuit by prosecutors, who are seeking forfeiture of seized bank accounts holding roughly $1.8 million of the more than $2.7 million in insurance payouts prosecutors claim were received by Golay, 75, and Olga Rutterschmidt, 73, of Hollywood.
The two women have pleaded not guilty to the 2005 murder of McDavid, 50, and to the 1999 murder of Paul Vados, 73, who died in a similar hit-and-run in Hollywood.
Soon after the women were arrested in May, investigators said they believed the victims were drugged and run over slowly. That assertion appears supported by the information revealed in the forfeiture case filed late Monday by the U.S. Attorney's Office.
While the coroner tested McDavid's body for prescription drugs, Vados' body was not similarly tested because it was not standard autopsy practice at the time, the papers state.
However, the bodies of both Vados and McDavid exhibited another sign that led investigators to believe they were not standing up when they were struck in the hit-and-runs. Neither man had broken or bruised legs, something that would typically happen when a person standing up is hit by a vehicle, according to the document.
Further, McDavid was still wearing his glasses, which would likely have flown off if he was hit hard enough to knock him down, the papers state.
Previously, investigators have said Golay and Rutterschmidt befriended the two men, paying to put them up in low-rent apartments for two years, after which it is more difficult under state law to revoke an insurance policy.
McDavid's roommate, Patrick Lamay, told a Los Angeles police detective that a woman calling herself "Olga" came to the apartment once to tell Lamay to move out, and that she was accompanied by an unidentified man with a revolver, the court papers state.
The women allegedly had rubber stamps made bearing McDavid's signature and that of other men, something police said was a factor in deciding to arrest the two women.
Authorities are trying to locate one of the men, Nicholas Koos, who shared an address with McDavid in 2005.
In applying for the life insurance policies, Golay and Rutterschmidt claimed variously to be McDavid's and Vados' fiancees, relatives and business partners, prosecutors allege.
The two women allegedly claimed in paperwork that Vados and McDavid were investors with $50,000 to $65,000 in annual income. In reality, government records showed McDavid made $42 in 2003, the papers state.
After the two men died, the women took steps to collect payouts from the insurance policies, according to authorities. Those payouts ranged from about $810,000 to $20,175 for a smaller policy, according to the court papers.
A search of Golay's apartment weeks after her arrest turned up four bottles of Vicodin, each of which initially contained 50 pills, according to the papers filed Monday. Three were prescribed to Helen Golay during a two-week period in September 2003, while the fourth was prescribed to her daughter, Kecia Golay, at some point after McDavid's June 22, 2005 death, the documents state.
An Ambien bottle found in Golay's apartment had a prescription date of June 24, 2002, and contained only white powder, not tablets, the papers state.
Golay's attorney, Roger Diamond, contended the prescription bottles don't implicate his client.
"I would say that it's not unusual for people to have painkillers in their apartments. It's like going into somebody's house and finding eggs in their refrigerator," Diamond said.
The women are due back in court Thursday, when a date is scheduled to be set for hearing to determine if there is enough evidence to order them to stand trial on two counts each of murder and conspiracy.
The forfeiture case was filed because the money had been seized in connection with federal fraud charges against the pair that were dismissed after the District Attorney's Office filed its murder case on July 31.
Diamond said the forfeiture suit is "a waste of taxpayer money because it should have been filed by the insurance companies."
"Basically, the U.S. Attorney's Office is doing the bidding of the insurance companies," the attorney said.
(© 2006 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)
