Wonderland Gang

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The Wonderland Gang was an organization of drug dealers who operated in the Los Angeles area in the late 1970s and early 1980s. On July 2, 1981 the gang met its demise in one of the bloodiest mass murders in the history of California, now known as the Wonderland murders.

Contents

[edit] Members

Members of the gang included:

  • Ronald Launius (leader)
  • Billy Deverell
  • David Clay Lind (a former prison acquaintance of Launius)
  • Joy Audrey Gold Miller (Deverell's girlfriend)
  • Tracy Raymond McCourt

The Wonderland Gang mainly trafficked in the burgeoning cocaine trade of the era, but most of its members were actually heroin addicts. Drugs were regularly dealt from a residence at 8763 Wonderland Avenue in the Laurel Canyon area of Los Angeles. The two bedroom split-level house was leased in Miller's name, she, her live-in boyfriend Deverell, and Launius were the usual residents. Lind, ordinarily a resident of the Sacramento area, came to Los Angeles in the summer of 1981 at Launius' behest, to aid in their growing drug distribution business. Bringing with him his girlfriend Barbara Richardson, the pair slept on the living room sofa during their tenure at the Wonderland house, where they spent much quality time.

[edit] Ron Launius

Launius was the undisputed leader of the gang, and he ruled the organization with an iron fist. Well known to the law enforcement community, he began his criminal career while serving with the US Armed Forces in Viet Nam (first rumored to have been in the 37th Marines, later said to have been in the Air Force. The 37th Marines story was coincidental with the story that he had been investigated for 37 murders before the Wonderland massacre, rather than 27 as later reported).

Over the years Launius was a suspect in 27 murders. In one of those murders, formal charges were filed for the murder of a drug informant. However, those charges were dropped when the primary witness against Launius also was found shot to death. [1]

Launius could keep a cool head under pressure, due to his military training. In the mid 1970s, in a deal gone bad, he was ambushed in Mexico. His wife was kidnapped by the Mexicans and held for ransom. Launius reputedly returned to the USA and robbed a bank, to come up with enough money to free his wife. Three of the Mexican assailants were quickly found dead. Ron returned to Northern California, where one by one, three of the dealers who had set him up were found dead. [2]

Launius was also a suspect in the as yet unsolved murder of sports agent Vic Weiss, who was found in the trunk of his car, with his hands tied behind his back and two bullets in his head. [3]

Launius partied as hard as he worked. When an autopsy of Launius was conducted after the murders, the LA Medical Examiner found that the 37-year-old Launius was suffering from cirrhosis of the liver, and numerous old and new intravenous drug injection scars, including some that were abcessed. [4] Like his partner in crime Deverell, Launius was fond of body art and sported a tattoo with his name "RON" on his left shoulder. [5]

[edit] Billy Deverell

While Launius was the alpha male of the Gang, the older Deverell was its elder statesman. In his testimony, David Lind noted that "Billy was a good old boy. Strong. Solid. Dependable. He wanted to get out of the life [drug sales] but the life was just too good". Deverell was enamoured with body art, as he sported a tattoo of a Gothic Cross at mid-chest, a tattoo on his thigh depicting a prisoner and the words EASY TIME, another tattoo emblazoning the words MI VIDA LOCA, and more than a dozen other tattoos. [6]

Intravenous drug use was de rigeur for members of the Gang. Deverell's autopsy , like that for all of the targets of the 1981 murders, documented extensive presence of intravenous drug injection scars. Additionally Deverell exhibited hyperplasia of the lymph nodes, a common sign of narcotics abuse. [7]

[edit] Barbara Richardson

While not an official member of the Wonderland Gang, Richardson was a girlfriend of David Lind's at the time, although it appears that they were not exclusive.[8] A young woman of 23 years of age, she was nonetheless ahead of her time, sporting no fewer than four tattoos. In 1981, female body art was extremely rare. Tattoos included images of a flower, a mushroom, a butterfly, and Minnie Mouse.[9] Lind referred to Richardson as "My Butterfly", likely a reference to the butterfly tattoo device.

Richardson also displayed a form of body art that the actual gang members also possessed - intravenous drug injection scars, as reported in the post mortem examination. [10]

[edit] Wonderland Murders

Main article: Wonderland Murders

[edit] Nash robbery

On June 29, 1981, the Wonderland Gang, along with pornographic film star John Curtis Holmes, conspired to launch a brutal home invasion and robbery upon Eddie Nash, a reputedly powerful organized crime figure. During this invasion, Launius shoved a gun barrel down Nash's throat, and Lind shot Nash's bodyguard, Gregory Diles, in the back. Racial epithets were also hurled at Nash and Diles.[11]

The robbery was an inside job of sorts, a setup. John Holmes was a close associate of Mr. Nash. Nash regularly referred to Holmes as "my brother". Early in the morning of the robbery, Holmes visited Nash's mansion obstensibly to party and to buy drugs. But on his way out, he left a patio door unlatched.

Holmes actually went to Nash's three times that morning. The first time, he forgot to unlatch the patio door. The second time he returned to the Wonderland hideout but some of the Gang members were extremely intoxicated from the heroin to which they were addicted. After the gang members revived, Holmes was worried that the patio door may have been locked again, so he returned to Nash's a third time, purchased some crack cocaine, unlatched the door, and notified the Gang that the home was ready for invasion.

Launius, Deverell, and Lind performed the invasion and robbery, whilst McCourt waited outside in a stolen Ford Granada and served as lookout. To avoid leaving any identifying traces, the actors had previously dipped their fingers in a product known as "Liquid Band-Aid®" so as to not leave any fingerprints behind.[12]

The robbery was a seemingly successful haul for the Gang, as they made off with more than $1,200,000 worth of cocaine, heroin, quaaludes, cash, antique guns, and jewelry.[13] But the events of the next two days would prove this to be a pyhrric victory.

[edit] Murders

Reportedly Nash had been tipped off by some of his associates, who happened upon John Holmes in Hollywood and noticed that he was wearing some of the stolen jewelry from the home invasion and robbery. Court testimony by Scott Thorson, reputed paramour of the entertainer Liberace, suggested that Holmes was brought to Nash's house and beaten until he confessed to planning the home invasion and identified the Wonderland Gang to Eddie's associates.

Two days after the Nash robbery, July 2, around 3:00 in the morning, three assailants entered the Wonderland house and bludgeoned Launius, Deverell, Miller, and Richardson, to death. Severely injured in the attack was Susan Launius, Ronald's estranged wife who, hoping to reconcile, had arrived in town the previous day.

Lind was spared from the carnage as he later testified that he had spent that night at a motel, consuming drugs with a prostitute.[14] McCourt, who did not reside at the home, was not present at the time of attack so he, too was spared.

Bloody though the attack may have been, neighbors paid no attention to the screams as the murders occurred. This was because the house was notorious for noise, parties, and mayhem around the clock. The murders were not officially reported to authorities until 4:00pm on July 2, after a furniture mover working next-door heard Susan Launius' moaning and went to investigate.

[edit] Suspects

When the crime scene was discovered by the LAPD, there was no shortage of suspects, as the Wonderland Gang had made many enemies during its reign at the top of the LA cocaine trade[15]. A contract was out on their lives as they had scammed a fellow drug dealer by selling him what turned out to be $250,000 worth of baking soda (instead of the cocaine for which he bargained). But in the end police zeroed in on the murders as a "revenge hit" ordered by The Nash.

LA County prosecutors made the decision to charge John Holmes with four counts of capital murder. David Lind was the lead witness for the prosecution, but he could testify to no more than the fact that the Gang had robbed Mr. Nash's house. In his testimony, Lind alleged that the entire Nash robbery was, in fact, concocted by John Holmes. As lurid as this testimony was, Lind had no testimony directly relevant to the commission of the Wonderland murders themselves, and there was no forensic evidence tying Holmes to the murder. In May 1982, Holmes was found innocent of all charges.

The Holmes trial was a milestone in American jurisprudence, as it was the first criminal trial in which videotape was introduced into evidence and played at the trial. The jury found no connection between the gruesome and bloody crime scene video and Holmes, however.

In 1989, a new witness came forward, Scott Thorson, the reputed paramour of the entertainer Liberace. Based on his deposition, formal charges were filed against Eddie Nash and Gregory Diles, his bodyguard. In court, Thorson testified that he was partying at Nash's home when John Holmes was brought in, and that Holmes was beaten severely until he confessed to his complicity, and that he identified the Wonderland gang as the perpetrators of the robbery. [16]

Nash and Diles were tried in 1990 in a unique proceeding, in which two separate juries observed the same trial. [17] The Nash jury returned a hung verdict, voting 11-1 to convict, and the Diles jury also returned a hung verdict, but with an 11-1 vote to acquit. As in the Holmes trial, David Lind recounted his testimony regarding the robbery of Nash.

In 1991 Nash and Diles were retried in a similar dual-jury proceeding, and this time they were both found innocent by 12-0 verdicts.

Nash later admitted to having bribed the lone holdout juror in his first trial, and to having ordered his associates to retrieve stolen goods from the Wonderland Gang. He denied having ordered the murders and received 4 and a half years in prison for unrelated charges. Police also suspected Diles' younger brother, Samuel, as being one of the assailents, however he was never charged.

After Holmes' death in 1988 from AIDS, his first wife Sharon Holmes, and his longtime manager Bill Amerson came forward and stated that the morning of the murders, Holmes came to their houses soaked in blood, claiming that as punishment for his involvement in Nash home invasion, he was forced at gunpoint to watch the massacre taking place, but otherwise not participating in it. However no forensic evidence was ever produced that either Nash or Holmes was involved.

[edit] Where are they now?

As of January 2007, the sole survivor of the robbery of Eddie Nash's mansion is Mr. Nash himself.

  • Ronald Launius, Deverell, Miller, and Richardson all died in the 1981 massacre.
  • John Curtis Holmes died in 1988 of AIDS
  • David Clay Lind died of a heroin overdose in 1995
  • Gregory Dewitt Diles also died in 1995, from liver failure.
  • Samuel Lawton Diles died in 2002 of unspecified causes.
  • Tracy Raymond McCourt died of unspecified causes in October of 2006. [18]

The other assailants who participated in the bludgeoning attack on the Wonderland Gang have neither been identified or prosecuted, so their fate and whereabouts are unknown.

[edit] References

  1. ^ Boston Globe news article regarding the Wonderland Murders, dated July 4, 1981,
  2. ^ Source: Director's commentary of the 2003 theatrical production, Wonderland
  3. ^ Source: LA Times Article "Who Shot Vic Weiss?", Jne 11, 1989
  4. ^ LA Medical Examiner's autopsy report, 81-8537, conducted immediately after the Wonderland Murders.
  5. ^ Ibid
  6. ^ LA Medical Examiner's autopsy report, 81-8538, conducted immediately after the Wonderland Murders.
  7. ^ Ibid
  8. ^ Lind testified at trial that at the time of the Wonderland Massacre, he was spending the night with a prostitute in the San Fernando Valley.
  9. ^ LA Medical Examiner's autopsy report, 81-8538, conducted immediately after the Wonderland Murders.
  10. ^ Ibid.
  11. ^ Allan MacDonell: In Too Deep. LA Weekly, 2 October 2003
  12. ^ Reference: Sworn testimony of David Lind during the preliminary hearing for John Holmes in 1982, as reported in the book Long Time Money and Lots of Cocaine, by Rodger Jacobs and published at LuLu.com
  13. ^ Lions Gate Productions feature film, "Wonderland", 2002
  14. ^ Trial Begins for 2 in Grisly Laurel Canyon Murders of Mid-1981, LA Times, March 21, 1990
  15. ^ Two Acquitted in Second Trial for '81 Laurel Canyon Murders , LA Times Article, January 18, 1991
  16. ^ LA Times news article, "Revenge Against Burglars Led to Slayings", March 27, 1990.
  17. ^ LA Times newspaper article, "Trial Begins for 2 in Grisly Laurel Canyon Murders", March 21, 1990
  18. ^ Ancestry.com SSDI Death Index Database
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