We both marvel at how beautiful the space is. Jayne comes down one floor to greet me and we take the stairs back up together. On the ground floor are trees, huge murals and animal statues.Īs I exit the cafeteria, I look up and there are Jayne and Michael Goldberg right outside the courtroom on a catwalk, one floor up. There are open catwalk bridges that crisscross back and forth for the second and third floors. The center of the entire building is an atrium space for the first four floors. I talked about the Ronald Reagan State Office Building back in April 2001, when I was here for the oral arguments in the Phil Spector appeal. I thank him for his time then head to the second floor cafeteria to get a bottle of water. The building’s security manager is kind but says that because of “security” I cannot take photographs. I've tried to describe this space before, but there's nothing like a photo to give readers a sense of what one is talking about. When I arrive at the state building where the local appellate court is held, I stop at the security station to see if it’s possible to photograph the catwalks inside the atrium space. All the gunshots were fatal, he said.UPDATE 7:15 PM edited for grammar, spelling, clarity Rasmussen suffered a bite on the arm and was shot three times, including in the heart and spine, he said. Taylor said the fatal attack involved a struggle that moved around the condominium. Rasmussen married Ruetten in November 1985 and she was killed the following February.Īttorneys for Rasmussen’s father and mother said outside court that the parents want answers to why it took so long for police to pursue Lazarus as a suspect after they had told detectives about several confrontations between their son-in-law’s ex-girlfriend and their daughter, a nursing director at Glendale Adventist Medical Center.Īttorney John Taylor said that when the father persisted in asking police what they had found out about the ex-girlfriend, “He was told repeatedly that he’d been watching too much TV.”

The case file did mention Lazarus because she had previously dated the victim’s husband, John Ruetten. Police officials have said Lazarus was not a suspect in 1986 because detectives believed that two robbers who had attacked another woman in the same neighborhood were to blame. I don’t know if he’s been interviewed yet, but he will be, as will a lot of people,” he said. Lazarus’ husband, Scott Young, a detective in the San Fernando Valley, knew nothing about the slaying, Beck said. “There was a significant struggle that preceded the homicide,” he said. Lazarus, a specialist in investigating art thefts, was arrested last week after colleagues in the homicide unit across a hallway at police headquarters examined the long-cold case and made what they say was a DNA match. Lazarus, 49, is accused of killing Sherri Rasmussen, who was bitten, beaten and shot in her condominium in 1986, when Lazarus had been on the police force for two years. He was not available for comment afterward. Her attorney, Mark Pachowitz, asked only for the delay.

She appeared to chat amiably with sheriff’s deputies guarding her as she stood behind a glass partition in the courtroom waiting for the proceeding, which lasted about two minutes. A veteran Los Angeles police detective was brought to court Tuesday in an orange jail jumpsuit to face a capital murder charge alleging she killed an ex-boyfriend’s wife 23 years ago when she was a young officer.ĭetective Stephanie Lazarus calmly answered, “Yes, your honor,” when Superior Court Commissioner Kristi Lousteau asked if she agreed to have her arraignment continued to July 6.

Stephanie lazarus