Forensics experts next in Rudin trial

Kim Smith

Monday, March 5, 2001 | 11:49 a.m.

Jurors in the Margaret Rudin murder case were to begin hearing testimony from forensics experts this morning.

The first person on prosecutors' witness list was Sheree Norman, a crime scene analyst for Metro Police.

Prosecutors suspect Rudin and an accomplice shot her husband, Ronald Rudin, in the head several times while he slept on Dec. 18, 1994, then decapitated and burned his remains within a trunk at Nelson's Landing, 45 minutes south of Las Vegas.

Rudin's attorney, Michael Amador, told jurors during opening statements Friday that he will prove Rudin's business associates had more motive, means and opportunity to kill him. He further said his forensic experts will prove Rudin, 64, was not killed in his bedroom or burned at Nelson's Landing, which is at Lake Mohave.

"We'll bury Ronald Rudin in this trial," Amador said. "We'll put to rest a lot of the questions. We come to you with the truth, and it is so very important that each of you listen to the testimony and watch carefully the things that are said here."

The state's first witnesses Friday were Stephen Vermilya and Russell Dillon, two Air Force military policemen who found Rudin's skull while on a nighttime fishing trip.

The men said they found the skull while hiking single file with two friends up a ravine back to their car. A single flashlight illuminated their way.

"I walked past it and someone said 'That's a real human skull,' " Vermilya said. "I thought my friends were playing a joke on me."

When he looked at it closer, Vermilya said, he saw dental work and cartilage.

As Chief Deputy District Attorney Gary Guymon questioned Vermilya and Dillon, he showed jurors photos of the skull on a large-screen TV. Each time a new photo was shown, Rudin flinched and averted her eyes.

Not realizing Searchlight was closer, Vermilya said he and his buddies drove back to Las Vegas and reported their find. The next morning, they directed Metro officers back to the scene.

On the way down, the officers noticed a small burn spot in the ravine, Vermilya said.

Upon closer inspection, the officers found bones, metal straps and hardware within the area, Vermilya said.

Injecting a bit of irony into the proceedings, Vermilya told defense attorney Thomas Pitaro that "Russ caught one fish, for the rest of us, it was just a bad fishing trip."

Prosecutors believe Rudin killed her husband to get her share of his $11 million estate and while in a rage over his latest affair. However, Amador contends that Rudin was killed by business associates and trustees who, for years, helped in dirty land deals.

Amador said his client was forced to become a fugitive following her indictment in April 1997 because she distrusted the criminal justice system in Las Vegas.

Rudin was arrested in Revere, Mass., in November 1999.

The trial is expected to last four to six weeks.