LOS ANGELES - Hours after standing in a Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department lineup in which two witnesses reportedly connected him to the 1988 double murder of auto racing legend Mickey Thompson and his wife, the prime suspect in the murders walked out of jail a free man on Monday.

Soon after sheriff's deputies released Michael Goodwin from custody, law-enforcement officials posted composite sketches of two murder suspects and a vehicle description related to the March 16, 1988 slayings. Two unidentified gunmen fatally shot Thompson and his wife, Trudy, at the couple's home in Bradbury, an affluent Los Angeles suburb.

Authorities, who long have believed Goodwin hired the actual killers, have said the shooters sped away on bicycles. Goodwin is Thompson's former business partner and rival in the racing-promotion business. Before the killings, Goodwin had lost $514,000 to Thompson in a civil dispute. Goodwin's attorney, Jeffrey Benice of Irvine, described Monday morning's lineup as a "ruse" that was patently ineffective. "It is highly prejudicial when anyone gets placed into a lineup under these circumstances. I think Mr. Goodwin's release shows unequivocally that the investigators' case is weak," Benice said.

Deputy Scott Butler, spokesman for the Sheriff's Department, said Monday that the case remains under investigation. Authorities arrested Goodwin Sunday night at his Dana Point home on a probable-cause warrant and held him without bail at Los Angeles County Jail. Butler could not comment on the morning's lineup or on Goodwin's subsequent release.

Back in March, a Los Angeles Superior Court Judge ordered Goodwin to appear in a lineup at Men's Central Jail, based on an affidavit filed by Detective Mark Lillenfeld. Goodwin argued that the order violated his Fourth Amendment rights, and a state appellate court ruled in June that a suspect cannot be forced to participate in a lineup unless he or she has been arrested. Goodwin v. Superior Court, B149818 (Cal. App. 2nd Dist. June 26, 2001). According to Benice, who was present at the lineup, six other men stood alongside Goodwin. The 56-year-old stood next to mostly younger men and one man in his 50s, Benice said.

Although two of the witnesses allegedly identified Goodwin, it was unclear what that meant because the witnesses refused to answer Benice's questions, he said. As for the effectiveness of a holding a lineup 13 years after the crime was committed, Benice said it's completely unorthodox. He believes investigators showed the witnesses a photograph of Goodwin before the lineup. But authorities would not answer his questions, he said. "I don't know where these [witnesses] came from. I suspect they were drummed up by the reward money offered by America's Most Wanted," Benice said.