Beverly Hills Confidential : A Century of Stars, Scandals and Murders

by Schroeder, Barbara

  TV-news crews, reporters, and over one hundred people gathered to watch the bizarre burial, which was estimated to have cost fifteen thousand dollars. As the cement was being poured into the gravesite, a police sergeant holding back the crowd was overheard commenting, “I hope we don’t have a wave of these funerals now. Next thing you know, someone will want to be buried in a 747.”

  One funeral spectator said thirty-seven-year-old Sandra West proved “You can take some of it with you.”

  1979

  Neutrogena CEO’s Triple-Murder Tragedy • A Bitter Killer

  Lloyd Cotsen, the president of Neutrogena Corporation, was reportedly in a taxicab in New York when he heard the news on the radio. A triple shooting had occurred in Beverly Hills in a house on the 900 block of North Bedford Drive. His wife Joanne, their fourteen-year-old son, Noah, and one of his friends, Christopher Doering, had just been found gagged, bound, and shot in the head, barely clinging to life. The killer was still on the loose.

  Initially, it appeared to be a robbery gone wrong. Then came information that Joanne Cotsen had been serving on the jury for a trial involving the Iranian protestors; perhaps there was a connection. But as officers pieced together the stories of eyewitnesses — and discovered one key piece of evidence — they knew they had a different kind of maniac killer on their hands. It would take detectives six months and several overseas trips to far-flung locations like Paris and Brussels to finally crack this case.

  Here’s how the events unfolded according to never-before-published excerpts from police files. (One note: the Cotsens were renting out their guest house, and the young man who lived there, and his girlfriend, walked into the main house unexpectedly during the crime. Their names were not made public. In this report they are described as Victim 4 and Victim 5.)

  On 5-23-79 Approximately 1245 hours, Victim 1 [Joanne Cotsen] left Beverly Hills Courthouse where she was a juror in a trial involving demonstrators arrested in connection with the Iranian student demonstration of 1-2-79.

  At approximately 1415 hours, Victim 2 and 3 [Joanne’s son Noah and his friend Chris] left school to go home and prepare for Hebrew school.

  The suspect entered the residence probably around 1300 hrs, confronted Victim-1, tied Victim with cord from residence. When Victim-2 and Victim-3 arrived…they were also confronted and tied. All Victim’s were tied hand and foot and gagged after being placed on the living room floor.

  The suspect then prepared for a long wait. (Possibly for Victim-1’s husband who was due back from New York)

  At approximately 1820, Victims 4 and 5 [the renter and his girlfriend] arrived and entered from a rear entry. As they entered the front…they were confronted by the suspect who was hiding in the adjacent powder room. Victim-4 and 5 were then taken to the living room and Victim-4 was tied with neckties and gagged. Suspect then walked Victim-5 toward rear bedroom. Victim-4 immediately freed his hands and feet and ran from the house for help. When the suspect heard Victim-4 slam door, he ran toward front of residence leaving Victim-5 alone. Victim-5 freed her hands and ran down a hall and through a glass door. As Victim-5 was running the suspect fired four rounds at her, all missing.

  Suspect returned to living room and shot Victim-1, 2, 3 in the head. Suspect exited the residence via the front door and drove away in a vehicle belonging to the family.

  Police, called to the scene by the renter, arrived around 6:30 p.m. Joanne Cotsen and the boys were taken to UCLA Medical Center, where she and Christopher Doering died the next day. Noah Cotsen died a week later. The renter and his girlfriend gave police a description of the murderer, saying he spoke with a Middle Eastern or European accent and was wearing dark brown, pressed slacks and a ski mask. Officers found the stolen car just four blocks from the residence in a storm drain.

  Investigators also discovered a small, brown, pharmaceutical bottle left in the powder room where the suspect had been. It contained chloroform. All the victims had been subdued with the chemical. Police had hit the evidence jackpot. The bottle was made exclusively at just one factory in Brussels, which happened to be where one of Cotsen’s bitter business rivals worked, one who had just recently made a trip to Beverly Hills: Erich Arnold Tali.

  Tali, forty-six, was married to a woman who had inherited a company that made a special soap called Neutrogena, a soap that Lloyd Cotsen had purchased the rights and trademark to some twenty years earlier when he was looking for ways to grow his father-in-law’s beauty products company. The translucent, amber-colored soap with the unusual scent was totally unique; there was nothing like it on the shelves in America. Cotsen came up with a marketing strategy that made the soap a huge success. The company changed its name to Neutrogena and became highly profitable.

  Tali was livid. He felt his company deserved much of that money. He accused Cotsen of stealing international rights to sell the soap, but Cotsen owned the trademark and rights. Tali sued Cotsen unsuccessfully at least three times, growing angrier as years went by. A co-worker in Brussels told Beverly Hills police, “Tali contains enough hate to kill anyone associated with the American firm.”

  At one point, before the murders, Cotsen reportedly sent Tali a round-trip plane ticket to come to Los Angeles as a peace-making gesture. The angry businessman never used that ticket; instead he bought his own and made the surprise visit to Cotsen’s house. When it became clear Cotsen wasn’t home, Tali took the rest of the family hostage. Police believe he was waiting to kill Cotsen upon his return, and that when the backyard renters showed up unexpectedly, Tali’s plan was foiled, so he killed the witnesses and fled.

  Investigators were hot on his trail. Armed with DNA evidence from the ski mask and a sweater he left behind, plus the eyewitness testimony from the renters, detectives made a cross-continental flight and arrived to interview Tali at his home in Brussels. When they rang the bell, his wife opened the door, tearfully explaining Tali had killed himself just a few hours earlier.

  In 1994, Cotsen sold Neutrogena to Johnson & Johnson. He took his millions from the sale and became a philanthropic retiree, giving away the riches that so infuriated his Belgian rival. As American inventor David Sarnoff once said, “Competition brings out the best in products and the worst in people.” No truer words could describe this tragic story.

  Clark Fogg’s Analysis:

  This is an excellent example of a crime where physical evidence left at the scene solved the case. It was a combination of trace hair fibers, fingerprints, and other physical evidence that collectively led investigators to a viable suspect. Also key: the victims were tied-up for a substantial time with no ransacking or sexual assaults taking place. This indicates there was a suspect-victim relationship of some kind. The investigation took the form of “the funnel format”—where detectives start by carefully investigating many aspects of the victims’ lives, subsequently reducing the facts down to identify the suspect.

  A victim of the tragedy, forty-two-year-old Joanne Cotsen.

  Another victim of the tragedy, Joanne Cotsen’s fourteen-year-old son, Noah.

  Noah’s sixteen-year-old friend Christopher Doering.

  Christopher Doering’s funeral.

  Sins, Sons and Sorrow

  The 1980s and 1990s

  Salacious sex tapes, stars slapping cops, and spoiled rich kids slaughtering their parents. Welcome to the 1980s and 1990s, no doubt the wildest period in Beverly Hills history.

  The juiciest of scandals starts off the Eighties: videotapes that supposedly feature department-store heir Alfred Bloomingdale frolicking with his kinky-sex mistress of twelve years, Vicki Morgan, and also allegedly feature some prominent Republican figures from President Reagan’s “Kitchen Cabinet.” The tapes are a pawn in an unusual palimony lawsuit filed by Morgan. (She wasn’t getting any more love money from Alfred. He was on his deathbed, and his wife, socialite Betsy Bloomingdale, had cut off the mistress’s weekly check.) The tapes never materialize—if they even existed at all—and a year after Alfred Bloomingdale di
es, his mistress is killed in a bizarre attack by her mentally deranged roommate.

  Also the talk of the town: nude statues on Sunset Boulevard. A twenty-three-year-old sheik and his nineteen-year-old wife buy and renovate a mansion, then paint the statues decorating the front fence with such lifelike details that traffic slows to a halt as people gawk and stare. One local interior designer laments, “I wouldn’t object to painting the hair brown—but even the hair ‘down there’?” The garish manor is destroyed by a mysterious fire in 1985. Crowds gather and chant, “Burn! Burn! Burn!” as flames light up the night sky.

  The Beverly Hills Police Department is finally stable, after several chiefs have come and gone. Seasoned Los Angeles Police Department veteran Marvin Iannone is now in charge and will stay for several years. Iannone is very familiar with handling all things celebrity: he was one of the first officers at Marilyn Monroe’s Brentwood home the night she died in 1962, something Iannone would never speak about publicly. His steely reserve and silence are traits very welcome in a town like Beverly Hills.

  The streets of Beverly Hills become a movie star of sorts as films like Beverly Hills Cop (1984) and Pretty Woman (1990) are released, but it’s what’s happening with actual stars on the streets that fill the tabloids. Talk show host Johnny Carson is arrested for drunk driving. Too intoxicated even to say his ABCs, he tries unsuccessfully to resist arrest. “I’m not going to the police station,” he slurs. “Not so you can have the National Enquirer and the press waiting for me!” The next night, Carson tells his national TV audience he regrets what he did, and he follows through on a promise that it will never happen again.

  Hot-blooded Hungarian actress Zsa Zsa Gabor gets the most press she’s had in a long time after she slaps a handsome police officer as he’s writing her a ticket for driving her white Rolls-Royce with expired tags. She is slapped with a fine and spends three days in jail for misdemeanor battery on a police officer. Officer and actress file dueling slander suits that are later dropped; Gabor finally pays her fine and does some time. The license plates and a flask found in her car remain in the evidence section of the city’s police department.

  There’s a new crime in town as the 1990s unfold: jewelry stores along Rodeo Drive and throughout the city are the victims of a rash of Rolex watch robberies. One such robbery turns deadly when a thief follows a man wearing a Rolex home. The thief shoots the man in front of his wife, then pulls the timepiece off the dead man’s arm. The wife struggles with the gunman, to no avail. She isn’t hurt; the thief is never caught. Several stores stop selling the hot timepieces after that incident. No wonder residents love this local news headline: “Man, 81, Kills Robbery Suspect.” Octogenarian Thomas Korshak, a retired jewelry merchant, walks into his Beverly Hills apartment lobby with his wife when a twenty-six-year-old thief accosts them, demanding their money and jewels. The frail Korshak pulls out a gun and kills the robber on the spot.

  The new Beverly Hills Civic Center opens in 1990, linking the library, and fire and police departments with the historic City Hall. This is the same year police are called out for another big crowd-control situation. It’s May 16, 1990, and beloved “Rat Pack” legend Sammy Davis Jr. has died at the age of sixty-four from throat cancer. Hordes of reporters, satellite trucks, and a seemingly endless stream of visitors and friends make a steady pilgrimage to the singer’s home at 1151 Summit Drive.

  Officers are dealing with a slew of attention-grabbing celebrity cases these days, including a real-life car chase between Rocky star Sylvester Stallone and paparazzi photographers. Stallone and the photographers’ vehicles crash into each other three times, neither side ever copping as to who really hit whom.

  At the posh Peninsula hotel, singer Courtney Love is arrested after allegedly overdosing on heroine; this happens at the same time her husband, Nirvana musician Kurt Cobain, is believed to have shot and killed himself in Seattle.

  And in 1998, “I Want Your Sex” singing-sensation George Michael is apparently acting out that title after he’s arrested for committing a lewd act in a restroom at Will Rogers Memorial Park across from the Beverly Hills Hotel. The singer, who alleges he was entrapped by an undercover “pretty cop,” tells television talk-show host Jay Leno that the officer played a game called “I show you mine, you show me yours, and I’ll take you down to the police station.” The officer’s slander suit against Michael is dismissed. The singer is fined and put on probation.

  There’s no doubt police work in Beverly Hills is unique; it’s a tough job protecting one of the wealthiest communities in the world. But as this century draws to a close, the department will find itself facing the most heinous and famous crimes ever to hit this one-of-a-kind town, giving new meaning to the phrase, “Only in Beverly Hills.”

  Betsy Bloomingdale was humiliated when her husband’s mistress, thirty-year-old Vicki Morgan revealed intimate details about sado masochistic romps she had with Bloomingdale’s husband, sixty-six-year-old Alfred.

  Vicki Morgan, mistress to Betsey Bloomingdale’s sixty-six-year-old husband.

  Courtney Love (with daughter Frances and husband Kurt Cobain) is booked into Beverly Hills jail, charged with drug possesion.

  Sammy Davis Jr. photographs his wife May Britt and their newly adopted son, Jeff.

  After his first DUI, talk-show host Johnny Carson never had a run-in with police again.

  Seventy-year-old Zsa Zsa Gabor said she wanted “that gorgeous policeman” (prior image) to know that he can’t manhandle women.”

  1984

  The BBC: Billionaire Boys Club • Cult-like Club of Rich Kids who Kill

  Joe Hunt wanted attention and fame in the worst way, and that’s exactly how he got it. Hunt, called a psychotic genius by many who knew him, used some of his rich friends to help fund a Ponzi scheme that spiraled out of control and led to two murders, three books, and a television miniseries.

  It all started during Hunt’s high school years at the prestigious Harvard School for Boys (now Harvard-Westlake). Hunt was admitted on a scholarship. He was, said a teacher, “One of the brightest students I’ve ever seen.” But while academically impressive, socially, Joe didn’t quite fit in. He longed to be liked by his classmates.

  Fast forward a few years. Hunt finished college, became a CPA in Chicago, made a lot of money, and returned to Los Angeles to start that Ponzi scheme, calling it “The Billionaire Boys Club.” He recruited several of his former classmates who were dazzled by his money, newfound confidence, charm, and generosity. At one of his motivational company meetings, Hunt handed out ten shiny new motorcycles as a reward to his top producers. One of his old high school acquaintances, Dean Karny, was so impressed with the boss’s business skills, he convinced his parents to invest $150,000 in the new company.

  Hunt finally had the respect he always felt he deserved from his high school acquaintances. Had anyone bothered to check, they would have realized Joe was a fraud: his trading privileges had been revoked in Chicago due to “questionable ethics.”

  After blowing through over a million dollars, Hunt suddenly found himself in need of a quick cash infusion—investors were getting nervous. He turned to an acquaintance, Ron Levin, a shady character who promised the BBC boss access to a big loan. When the money never materialized, Hunt wanted revenge. He decided to pay Levin a visit. He took his new security chief, Jim Pittman (the doorman at his condominium), to Levin’s home. Levin was never heard from again. As the security guard would later testify, he shot Levin in the head, then he and Hunt wrapped the body in a comforter and dumped it in a canyon.

  Hunt returned to his office and told his team the BBC was in serious financial trouble, and he asked if anyone had access to some big money—and fast. According to Hunt, group member Reza Eslaminia volunteered; he said his dad, a wealthy Iranian who lived in San Francisco, had plenty of money. Hunt decided that a select group of BBC members, including Reza, would abduct the dad and bring him to a safe house in Los Angeles where they would torture him u
ntil he transferred thirty million dollars to the group. Joe anointed himself “The Torture Master.”

  But the extortion plan backfired. The young men had stuffed the fifty-six-year-old Eslaminia into a steamer trunk, and while on the trip back to Los Angeles, he either suffocated or had a heart attack and died. The group rolled the elder Eslaminia’s body down a hill in Soledad Canyon.

  Club member Dean Karny, who was part of the kidnapping crew, decided he’d seen enough. He got nervous and went to the police. He asked for, and was granted, immunity in exchange for telling officers the almost unbelievable story behind the BBC. Murder charges were then filed against Hunt and other members of the kidnapping crew, including Ben Dosti. Reza Eslaminia and Ben Dosti were sentenced to life without parole for the murder of Reza’s father. The court of appeals reduced their sentences in 1998, but after twelve years in prison, their convictions were overturned on a technicality. After a retrial, Dosti pled guilty. Both were sentenced to time served and are now out of prison. The charges against Eslaminia were eventually dismissed due to lack of evidence. Dosti is now a pastor in Northern California. Eslaminia says he is a legal consultant and also involved in film production and financing. Karny, who received immunity, was given a new identity and is a lawyer practicing somewhere in California.