He had the biggest pile of coke Id ever seen in my entire life, says Jeana. I stood there and watched them kill those people., I was involved in a robbery, John began, and he told the story. Now, in an exclusive interview with the Observer, . During the day, she worked in a nursing home. March 3 (UPI) -- Firefighters in Britain responded to a home to rescue a horse that had fallen into its owner's swimming pool and was unable to get itself out. A year ago, shed been busted for dealing drugs out of the Wonderland house. At an alarming rate.. In a recent interview with The Times, Sharon Holmes, who divorced the late actor in 1984, described for the first time the story her husband told her less than three weeks after the July 1 killings. He wanted witness protection, a new name, money, a home. Do you find the threat of earthquakes preferable to the threat of hurricanes and long winters? Show your appreciation with the gift of Flickr Pro. Get the fuck out of here! he screamed. Pharmaceutical cocaine was one of the ingredients. Come with us, Sharon., It can be the three of us, Sharon, like old times.. John was terrified that I was going to confront her. The murders were so brutal that police were comparing the case to the Tate-LaBianca murders by the Manson Family. How could you do this thing! Eddie Nash screamed. I ran out the door, down to the pool, and he ran after me, the fool. Nash was found guilty of possessing two pounds of cocaine for sale. Id like you to meet Mr. John Holmes, hed say. Holmes nodded his head, put out his cigarette, closed his eyes. Susan Launius was severely beaten in her bed, but she narrowly survived, albeit with amnesia, head injuries, and the loss of a finger. Ronald S. Coen, now a Los Angeles Superior Court judge, argued that the fatal beatings were intended to avenge the humiliating armed robbery of Los Angeles nightclub owner Adel Nasrallah, also known as Eddie Nash. Let him scream? Too many. If you could live in LA during any era, when would it be? Susan Launius | Susan Lanius (unlucky) wife of Ron Lanius pl | Flickr . The man in the suit was Los Angeles Police Department detective Tom Lange. Go!. He said he was told he would be killed and people in the book would be killed if (Holmes) didnt do what (Nash) wanted. Sydney Pollack's adaptation of Horace McCoy's "They Shoot Horses, Don't They?" By the time Johns half brother was born, John was spending most of his time in the woods, hunting, trapping, fishing, staying away from Harold. Jobs People Learning Dismiss Dismiss. Its the cops.. LOS ANGELES -- The lone survivor of a bloody attack at a Laurel Canyon home last summer testified today she does not recall seeing porno star John Holmes in the house the night she was attacked and four others were bludgeoned to death. The Top 5 newsletter catches you up with LAs top 5 stories in just 3 minutes. I said, Please, just let me get my clothes and my dog and well leave.'. After a while, the weather report came on. 3 children killed, 2 hospitalized in North Texas domestic incident, At least 5 dead following year's first severe spring weather outbreak, 'Saving Private Ryan,' 'True Romance' actor Tom Sizemore dead at 61, Dozens killed, injured as Jakarta fuel depot fire engulfs neighborhood, Governor of Philippine province, 5 others killed in gun attack. Dickman and Throbbin, a lampoon of Batman and Robin. I believe I was watching TV and it seems like a bunch of people were coming in and out,' Mrs. Launius said. They made him beg for his life. Change your mind. Holmes, 37, was formally charged with four counts of murder and one of attempted murder following his arrest last December in Miami. Send us a tip using our anonymous form. Do you agree with that assessment? All his lawyers I think he had maybe six or seven working on different things all his managers, employees, customers, everyone, would come to him. . Here he is, he has two women with him. March 3 (UPI) -- A Kentucky man who stopped to buy some breakfast said he lost his appetite when he won $50,000 from a scratch-off lottery ticket. They were stupid. I told where the robbers lived and how to get there. He showed up at the house in the early evening. Copyright 2023 United Press International, Inc. All Rights Reserved. So much blood! he groaned over and over. Sellers agreed to talk to The Times on the condition that the paper not reveal her true name. Miss Miller's shiny white 1969 Mercedes 280 SL was used to deliver narcotics to her customers, detectives said. Susan Launius - Remote Medical Transcriptionist - LinkedIn By June, she was thinking, Well, Im not doing anything here. On June 27th, two days before the robbery at Nashs, she flew to Los Angeles. Haltingly, Holmes confessed to his wife that he had played a central role in four brutal murders earlier that month in a drug dealers hillside home in Laurel Canyon. Florida woman runs ultra-marathon distances for 23 consecutive days. When asked by Holmes' attorney what she remembered after that, she replied, 'nothing.'. One woman who had sex with Nash remembers a lot of temptation. One woman survived the attack. Susan Launius, who lay wounded with severe head injuries for hours before being discovered in the house by neighbors last July 1, testified during Holmes' preliminary hearing that she could only recall seeing 'shadowy figures.'. He had a full erection. Inside were his drugs, his glass pipe, baking soda and a petri dish for cooking cocaine powder into rock base, a bottle of 151 rum and cotton swabs for lighting the pipe. The three went back to Sharons house. She was moving to a house. A girl from the dorm recommended him. We will review the memorials and decide if they should be merged. No one but Holmes has ever been charged in the murder case. Blood! That evening, Chinn wrote a three-page screenplay; a partnership was born. We went to a motel, had a nice reunion. The 100 Best Albums of 2022. Whatever. 26th Hall of Fame. I'll sidestep Nathanael West's blistering "Day of the Locust" to applaud some more recent works like Michelle Huneven's "Jamesland" and the Nina Zero private eye novels by Robert Eversz. I tried to shut his eyes like in the movies, but they wouldnt stay shut., Holmes didnt want a funeral, but he did have a last wish. The house at 8763 Wonderland rented for $750 a month. Net Worth in 2019. A sunny room in the Veterans Administration Hospital in Sepulveda, California. He worked for others for a time, then opened Beefs Chuck, a hotdog stand on Hollywood Boulevard. His clothes were ripped, he was bloody from head to toe. Id usually fall asleep on the couch.. Accident car um he stammered. COOPER: (Reading) And when the new year's sunshine . I won't do an extensive write-up of the Wonderland Murders, as they've been written about on here before: https://www.reddit.com/r/UnresolvedMysteries/comments/430cdk/four_bloody_unsolved_wonderland_murders/. His drug of choice was freebase, home-cooked crack cocaine, and he was smoking it at the rate of two to three ounces a day. Others looked like theyd been sucking on the pipe a little too long. They took back his key to Wonderland, and Launius punched him out, then hit Holmes with his own blackthorn walking stick. Copyright 2023 Penske Business Media, LLC. One day in 1970, Holmes met Hawaiian producer Bob Chinn. In jail, Holmes went on a hunger strike. Ill have them on their knees! Nash ranted to Thorson. Ronnie Lee Launius (1944-1981) - Find a Grave Memorial Along the way, in Colorado, Mr. McKenna was murdered in 1989 when ambushed while returning home in his limousine; his killer sprayed bullets into the vehicle, killing McKenna. Two years later, Ricks reduced Nashs sentence to time served, and Nash was released. They made a run to McDonalds for hamburgers. They lived in London, Paris, Michigan, Florida. He has just published his latest project about one of Los Angeles's most well known murder cases in the 80s. There was a lot of screaming going on, Holmes told his wife. John was doing a lot of drawing. His bodyguard, Gregory De Witt Diles, was a karate expert and convicted felon who weighed a blubbery 300 pounds. He was prepared to testify that Eddie Nash had sent Holmes and Diles to Wonderland Avenue and that Nash felt responsible for the bloody mess that resulted. The 43-year-old actor died as a result of complications arising from his infection with the AIDS virus. Ill pick you up.. Are you afraid its withering and dying? she said, laughing. Ronnie Launius - Ancestry.com Launius is also known to have been an associate of Horace McKenna, a former CHP officer and strip club/nightclub owner with connections to prostitution, drug-smuggling, and gambling in the L.A. area. If somebody fucked with him. Holmes thought Nash was the most evil man hed ever met, but he couldnt quite figure him out, so he respected him. It sounds silly, but you know how you can meet someone for the first time and its like you know them already?, After the film, John and Laurie, who looked like Jeana, began dating. The day after the robbery, someone who knew Nash apparently spotted Holmes in Hollywood, wearing a piece of jewelry that had been stolen from Nashs home, he told his wife. Girls' Singles. Coroner Thomas Noguchi said early autopsy results on the bodies found Wednesday -- 12 hours after the neighbors ignored the screams for mercy -- indicated the victims had been beaten to death. The 200 Greatest Singers of All Time Sharon stood with arms crossed. We cut him loose.. A naturalized American, Nash came to California from Palestine in the early Fifties. Then, when Eddie Nash got out of jail, John was very, very worried. Jeana was afraid to look at John. Chris caught up. John said he felt like he was chosen to get AIDS because of who he was, how he lived. Eversz is one of the best unsung novelists in the crime genre we have working today. Mary was a Bible-thumping Baptist John remembered screaming, yelling, his father puking all over the kids. John Holmes was famous, at least in some circles. The Interviews 25th Anniversary. This button displays the currently selected search type. Laurie worked as a secretary. Aftermath Lind and McCourt were both away from the scene at the time of the murders, so they were able to survive unharmed. The letters "IC" pronounced properly can say "icy" meaning very cold. How you doing, John? said the man in the gray suit, leaning over the safety rail of the bed. Jeana leaned out the window, and they hugged. He cooked coke all night long. The Wonderland Gang. Launius' wife, Susan Murphy, also claimed that she and Launius were involved in a drug deal gone wrong in Mexico in 1972 or '73, during which she was taken hostage but saved by her husband when he killed her captors. The Four on the Floor Wonderland Murders True Crime It was 1.6 miles from Wonderland Avenue to Dona Lola Place, which was fortuitous, because the stolen Ford Granada driven by the Wonderland Gang was running on empty. Diles got seven years on charges stemming from the drug raids. Nash was on the job day and night, wearing a tall white chefs hat, waiting tables himself. Arriving back at Wonderland just after dawn, Holmes announced the coast was clear. What now? she thought. What compels you to revisit the slayings and what does the story say about Los Angeles, in the 80s and now? Almost everything publicly known about porn king John Curtis Holmes is apocryphal, anecdotal, secondhand or informed by conjecture. Launius, Deverell, and Miller, along with the girlfriend of an accomplice, Barbara Richardson, died from extensive blunt-force trauma injuries. This was it. Holmes broke into cars along the way. His lawyer lent him a Volkswagen Beetle and $100, and Holmes showed up at his friend Amersons house. At night, she baby-sat for David and Karen. Help me. A fifth victim was carried out alive. Before them were two pairs of handcuffs, a stolen police badge, several automatic pistols and a dogeared sheet of paper, a floor plan. Her husband, Ron, 37, of the Topanga Canyon area of Los Angeles, was one of the victims. Your mother? Amerson says Holmes spent most of his time playing cards and shooting darts. She told him to get the fuck out of my life. He couldnt call Jeana. Jeana packed her suitcase, gathered up her Chihuahua. The aunt sent him to fencing school, dancing school, a school of etiquette. 'When you're talking about the star witness in a case like this I think you can safely assume that we've got her pretty well guarded,' a pllice spokesman said. On their first date, hed brought a bottle of Mateus and a handful of flowers. Shed never seen him look scared before. WEARS WAR has moved to a new website! - WordPress.com Jeana sat very still on the edge of the bed, watching a TV that was mounted on the wall. We scattered his ashes over the ocean.. He showed Chinn his portfolio of stills, then stripped. The Devil and John Holmes - Rolling Stone She hadnt heard from him in, what, six months? Latinx Files: In praise of Jenna Ortega, Aubrey Plaza and moody, deadpan Latinas, Arizona governor wont proceed with execution set by court, Civilians flee embattled town of Bakhmut as Ukrainian pullout looms. They were going underground. Based on my research, "Wonderland"arrives closest to the truth but in both films an apologist's tone creeps in with reference to Holmes. A gate was unlocked, and Holmes walked up the stairs to the entrance with the gunmen concealed behind him. how much does a cfl general manager makeduskull evolution arceus Wednesday afternoon, July 1st, two days after the robbery. Police, however, believe that Holmes actually took part in the fatal beatings. . If you were forced to live in a neighboring county, which would you choose? Hed say, Count this. Were talking $56,000 in two boots.. John was tired of the whole industry, she says. What really cracks me up is people believe he was a dope dealer. Record information. This anecdote right there tells me that Launius has a body count. Dismiss. John Holmes died on March 13th, 1988. Hed underestimated Nash once, but hed never do it again. Now it was midnight in the parking lot at the Safeway in Glendale. ''Wonderland,'' directed by James Cox, is part of a curious, somewhat unsavory subgenre of movies that involve washed-up, sort-of-famous people and death by bludgeoning. For the last several years, Nash had rarely left his white-stone ranch house in Studio City. He has a fascinating style and I liken him to Raymond Carver if Carver had decided to write about L.A.'s slumming angels. After a while, I said I didnt want to go out on the beach anymore. It was Thursday, July 2nd, 1981. They called it Louise. Even Near The Hollywood Sign, Authorities ID Man Arrested In Killing Of LA Auxiliary Bishop David O'Connell As Husband Of Housekeeper, Another Missing Hiker Has Been Found Dead In San Gabriels As Search For Actor Julian Sands Continues. By May, Jeana began taking his calls. They were married in August 1965 at Fort Ord, California. He beat the shit out of me, then walked back up to the room. In the weeks before the killings, Coen told the jurors, Holmes ferried property stolen by the Wonderland Avenue gang to Nashs heavily secured home in Studio City, where he exchanged it for drugs. Apparently, Holmes had made good his promise and stopped doing drugs. 5 Questions Every Manager Needs to Ask Their Direct Reports Your tax-deductible financial support keeps our stories free to read, instead of hidden behind paywalls. John was carrying two suitcases when he met her.