Rudin unhappy with public defenders

Kim Smith

Tuesday, May 30, 2000 | 10:24 a.m.

Margaret Rudin wants a "dream team" of defense attorneys. District Judge Joseph Bonaventure told her Friday her lawyers are fully competent to handle her case.

Rudin complained in a letter to Bonaventure that her public defenders, Jordan Savage and Will Ewing, have too little time to work on her case because of their case loads. Moreover, the state and those investigating on behalf of her husband's estate have six years on those representing her.

"Whosoever must defend me at trial is up against impossible odds," Rudin wrote.

Rudin, 56, is awaiting trial in the murder of her husband, Ron Rudin, 64.

According to prosecutors, Rudin or an accomplice shot her husband in the head as he was sleeping on Dec. 18, 1994. They believe he was then decapitated, placed in a trunk and taken to the Lake Mohave area where the trunk was set on fire.

Ron Rudin's remains were found about one month later and identified through dental records and a distinctive bracelet he wore.

Rudin disappeared around the time a Clark County grand jury indicted her in connection with her husband's death in April 1997. She was finally found in Massachusetts in November.

Bonaventure discussed Rudin's letter to him Friday at a hearing where Ewing and Savage attempted to convince him prosecutors don't have enough evidence to hold her.

In that letter, Rudin also complained that her attorneys seem to be discouraging her from helping them, although she has nothing but time to read the 2,000 pages of evidence she has been provided thus far.

"This is causing me extreme anxiety, worry and apprehension that a horrid high profile case, as my problems have turned out to be, should become at the most opposite end of Lady Justice's scale from Sandy Murphy's 'dream team' defense," Rudin wrote. "It appears as if justice is equal to whatever defense a client can buy."

Rudin asked Bonaventure to appoint her an attorney the "caliber of proven defense excellence" as JoNell Thomas, Richard Wright or Tom Pitaro.

Bonaventure pointed out that while Murphy's attorney, John Momot, is excellent, Murphy was convicted of murdering Ted Binion.

As for Savage and Ewing, neither one of them are "rookies," Bonaventure said. Between them they have more than 15 years experience.

Chief Deputy District Attorney Chris Owens said defendants are entitled to be represented by public defenders, but they don't have the right to choose who they are.

Owens then turned to the evidence against Rudin.

The marriage between Ron Rudin, a firearms dealer and real estate executive, and Margaret Rudin was shaky, Owens said. So much so that Mrs. Rudin was not allowed into her husband's office, and she bugged it.

Owens told Bonaventure that Ron Rudin was shot with a .22 caliber handgun, and one year after his body was found, a scuba diver found a weapon in Lake Mohave that turned out to be the murder weapon.

The weapon belonged to Ron Rudin and had been reported missing by Rudin six years before he died and a few months after he married Margaret, Owens said. Margaret Rudin had unusual access to that weapon, he said.

Owens also pointed out that in the days following Ron Rudin's disappearance, Margaret Rudin hired a day laborer to clean some stains in the hallway and master bedroom.

The same witness also told investigators that days later he dismantled Ron Rudin's bed, placed it in storage and ripped up the bedroom carpeting at Margaret Rudin's assistance, Owens said. The room was turned into an office within two weeks of Ron Rudin's disappearance and before investigators even thought he might be dead.

Based on the laborer's comments, Owens said forensic experts did tests that turned up evidence of blood splatters on the wall and a light fixture in the master bedroom. That blood matched Ron Rudin's blood and showed that someone had shot him as he was lying in bed.

The trunk Ron Rudin was found in was seen a few days before his disappearance in Margaret Rudin's antique store, and it wasn't there afterward, Owens said. Rudin had no sales receipt to show she had sold it, either.

Ewing argued that no tests were done to determine how old the blood in the bedroom was or when Ron Rudin was killed. He further said that there's no evidence linking Rudin to the murder weapon or Lake Mohave.

The authorities have no way of knowing how Ron Rudin's body got to the lake or who was involved, Ewing said.

Bonaventure scheduled another hearing in the case for June 16.