Elderly "Black Widows" Sent to Prison

By Pamela Mortimer

Hollywood residents Helen Golay, 77, and Olga Rutterschmidt, 75, were sentenced to two consecutive life terms each on Tuesday for the murders of indigent men. The women, dubbed "Black Widows" collected $2.8 million from insurance policies they’d taken out on the victims.

In April, Golay and Rutterschmidt were convicted of first-degree murder and conspiracy to murder for financial gain in reference to the deaths of two Los Angeles area homeless men: 73-year-old Paul Vados, who was killed in a hit and run in an alley in Hollywood on Nov. 8, 1999; 50-year-old Kenneth McDavid was killed in similar circumstances in Westwood on June 21, 2005.

Prosecutors said the women had devised a scheme in which they would take out insurance policies on the men and then house them for two years, the period of time required to avoid suspicion by the insurance companies. Golay told officials she was the fiancée of both victims, Rutterschmidt claimed to be a cousin.

Police managed to link the cases when a detective investigating one of the cases overheard a colleague describe a similar scenario in which a victim was run over in a dark alley. Los Angeles police Detective Rosemary Sanchez, along with fellow officer Dennis Kilcoyne, were the investigators. Sanchez said the crucial piece of evidence was uncovered when Golay called the Automobile Club of Southern California asking for roadside assistance for a disabled 1999 Mercury Sable station wagon, which was located about 1,000 feet from McDavid's body the night of the murder.

In an attempt to reduce charges, defense attorneys conceded the women were responsible for insurance fraud but tried to convince the jury that they had devised a murder conspiracy. Attorney Roger Jon Diamond claimed the women's idea was to take out insurance policies on "old, sick homeless people" who would most likely die soon.

Before the women’s conviction, the jury watched a secretly recorded video of the Black Widows in lockup shortly after their arrests. Rutterschmidt rebuked Golay, saying that taking out 23 insurance policies was the reason they were caught.

"It's your fault," Rutterschmidt told Golay. "You can't have that many insurances. You were greedy. That's the problem."

Los Angeles Superior Court Judge David S. Wesley condemned the women, saying the men they murdered only required food, water and shelter and thought the women were being kind in order to help them.

"Instead, these unfortunate men were sacrificed on your altar of greed," Wesley said.

"They didn't need it, but they wanted it," Deputy District Attorney Truc Do said of the women’s fraudulent scheme to get money. "(The) motive absolutely was greed."

"They spent a lot of their time worrying about money, trying to get money," said Deputy District Attorney Bobby Grace. "... We were able to use, you know, motive, as a big foundation of the case, and that was important."

Grace said the jurors on the case "felt that Olga Rutterschmidt was just as big a part of the whole scheme as Helen Golay."

"In fact, they felt that in some ways she was smarter than Helen Golay," the prosecutor said, because Golay paid the premiums and the expenses to house the men for two years. Although Rutterschmidt "didn't put up any money", she collected nearly $1 million.