Binion’s lifestyle described

Wednesday, Aug. 18, 1999 | 11:13 a.m.

Several witnesses who spent time with Ted Binion in the hours before his Sept. 17 murder were to take the witness stand today in the preliminary hearing for his accused killers.

Binion's girlfriend, Sandy Murphy, and her reported lover, Montana contractor Rick Tabish, are charged in Binion's slaying. The former casino executive's body was found at his home next to an empty bottle of the prescription sedative, Xanax.

Among those scheduled to testify were Binion's housekeeper Mary Montoya-Gascoigne, real estate agent Barbara Brown, heroin dealer Peter Sheridan and gardener Tom Loveday. The Sun previously reported what all four have told investigators during the course of a nine-month homicide investigation that has attracted national attention.

Montoya-Gascoigne, who was told not to show up at Binion's 2408 Palomino Lane home the day of his death, provided investigators with a long list of coins, cash, jewelry and diamonds missing from the ex-Horseshoe Club operator's home. She also can shed light on the collapse of Binion's relationship with Murphy, as well as physical evidence, such as a fresh stain on Binion's bed, that investigators have linked to his murder.

Information the housekeeper provided last week led prosecutors to file five new criminal charges against 27-year-old Murphy related to the Sept. 19 attempted theft of Binion's silver fortune in Pahrump.

Brown was expected to testify about a crucial telephone call she made to Binion's home at 12:15 p.m. on Sept. 17. An emotional Murphy answered the phone and told Brown she was cleaning up a big mess in a bathroom. Murphy was quoted as saying, "Nobody understands what it has been like living with a drug addict."

Detectives believe Binion already was dead when that phone call occurred.

Sheridan told detectives he supplied Binion with 12 balloons of crude tar heroin the night before his death. A balloon is regarded as a single fix of heroin.

Binion, Sheridan said, smoked the street drug and never ingested it, which supports a police theory that Binion was forced to drink a fatal cocktail of heroin and Xanax. An autopsy found a liquid mixture of both drugs in Binion's stomach.

Loveday has told investigators about the unusual occurrences he saw while working in Binion's yard the day of his slaying. The curtains in the back of the home were drawn, Binion's dogs appeared apprehensive outside and Murphy's black Mercedes wasn't parked in its usual spot, he said.

The preliminary hearing, expected to last into next week, is being conducted by Justice of the Peace Jennifer Togliatti. It will determine whether Murphy and Tabish and four other defendants charged with crimes related to Binion's death will stand trial.

Also listed as witnesses today were some of the authorities who were the first to arrive at the scene of Binion's death, including fire department paramedic Ken Dickenson and Metro Police crime lab specialist Mike Perkins.

One of Binion's longtime attorneys, Richard Wright, also could be called to the stand. Wright, a lawyer for the gambling figure's $30 million estate, can talk about the demeanor of Murphy and Tabish in the immediate hours after Binion's death, as well as the attempt to steal Binion's silver two days later.

On Tuesday, both Murphy and the 34-year-old Tabish appeared to take an active role in their defense during the televised hearing. Murphy often was observed taking notes and whispering in the ear of her lawyer, Bill Terry. During breaks, she chatted with reporters and friends in the courtroom. And she brought back sandwiches with William Fuller, the Irish-born music promoter who put up her $300,000 bail. Fuller again said he believes in her innocence.

Prosecutors, meanwhile, presented witnesses Tuesday to show that Murphy and Tabish had a romantic relationship and financial motive to kill Binion.

One of those witnesses, high-fashion clothing salesman Christopher Hendrick, was to resume testifying this morning.

Hendrick testified Tuesday about a conversation he had with Murphy at a Sept. 1 fashion show in which she said she was breaking up with Binion and had found an attorney to look out for her interests.

Murphy also talked about her wealthy new boyfriend (Tabish) who she said was pursuing her.

On cross examination from Terry, Hendrick, who was working at Gianni Versace at the Forum Shops at Caesars, acknowledged that he had become legally drunk at the fashion show. But he said he was not drunk when Murphy told him about her troubles with Binion.

Hendrick was fired from his job at Gianni Versace for talking to private detective Tom Dillard, who is working for Binion's estate, about his conversation with Murphy.

He testified that Murphy telephoned him in January to deny some of the statements he claimed she had made and offer to help him. Dillard, he said, also offered him legal assistance if he chose to fight his former employer.

Togliatti planned to decide today whether to allow Hendrick's testimony into the record. The salesman inadvertently violated an order barring witnesses from sitting in the courtroom prior to their testimony. Hendrick said he was not aware of the order.

Earlier, Deana Perry, a manicurist at the Neiman Marcus salon at the Fashion Show mall, took the witness stand to talk about statements Murphy had made to her about Binion while having her nails done a week before his murder.

Murphy, Perry testified, predicted Binion would die of a heroin overdose within three weeks.

Perry said Murphy described Binion as "kind of an asshole," but "was going to stay with him until he died" because she stood to inherit a lot of money.

Murphy also talked about wanting to go to upcoming social events after Binion's death -- an Andre Agassi children's benefit and the opening of the Bellagio -- with her new boyfriend.

Natalie Vogt, a former front desk clerk at the Peninsula Hotel in Beverly Hills, Calif., identified records presented by Chief District Attorney David Roger that showed Murphy and Tabish checked into the upscale resort the weekend before Binion's slaying.

Murphy, Vogt said, signed in as "S.M. Tabish" and requested a room with a jacuzzi and two dozen long-stemmed roses and an expensive bottle of wine as a "surprise for her husband."

Defense attorneys, however, attempted to show that the Beverly Hills visit was not romantic in nature.

In other testimony, Howard Hansell, a vice president at BankWest of Nevada, discussed as expected a $200,000 loan he had arranged for Tabish on June 19, 1997 for his company, MRT Transportation of Nevada. Tabish, Hansell said, did not pay off the loan by its Sept. 19 due date, the day Tabish was arrested digging up Binion's silver in Pahrump.

Vicky Zeier, the county clerk in Missoula, Mont., testified that the Internal Revenue Service filed hundreds of dollars worth of liens against Tabish and his companies in 1997 and 1998.

Prosecutors believe Tabish killed Binion to get to his money.