Laborer lands $25,000 Rudin reward

Kim Smith

Thursday, Sept. 13, 2001 | 9:22 a.m.

A day laborer who helped prosecutors convict Margaret Rudin in the December 1994 shooting death of her husband will receive a $25,000 reward.

Las Vegas attorney Earl Monsey said Ronald Rudin's trustees, Harold Boscutti and Sharron Cooper, have decided Augustine Lovato is entitled to the entire reward offered in the case.

Prosecutors believe Margaret Rudin and an unknown accomplice shot Ronald Rudin to death in his bedroom, decapitated him and then burned his remains inside a trunk near Lake Mohave.

Lovato told authorities that days after Ronald Rudin disappeared Margaret Rudin hired him to convert her husband's bedroom into an office.

During the process, Lovato claimed he saw flecks of what appeared to be blood on Margaret Rudin's portrait positioned above the bed. He also said that while cutting up the bedroom carpeting he kept getting "flicked" in the face with a dark brown, scab-colored substance.

Rudin, 58, was convicted of first-degree murder May 1 and sentenced Aug. 31 to life in prison with the possibility of parole after 20 years.

Defense attorney Thomas Pitaro tried to cast doubt on Lovato's testimony by pointing out discrepancies in his various statements and by producing a receipt that showed Rudin replaced the carpeting a full week after Lovato claims it was replaced.

Monsey said Lovato will receive a check after Ronald Rudin's third and final beneficiary signs the necessary paperwork.