Daily Journal - Jun 9, 2004
DA Charges Businessman In Two Deaths
Former Partner Is Accused in Murders Of Car Racer, Wife -- Gunmen on Bicycles
By Leslie Simmons and Dan Evans
Daily Journal Staff Writers
LOS ANGELES - The Los Angeles County district attorney's office Tuesday filed murder charges against Orange County motocross businessman Michael Goodwin in the 1988 double murders of racing legend Mickey Thompson and his wife.
The two counts of murder against Goodwin, a former business partner of Thompson, includes special circumstances of lying in wait and multiple murders. The possibility of seeking the death penalty will be considered when the case is closer to trial, the district attorney's office said. People v. Goodwin, GA052683 (L.A. Super. Ct., filed June 8, 2004).
The Orange County district attorney's office in 2001 charged Goodwin with conspiracy, based on allegations that the murders were plotted at Goodwin's Dana Point home and that the victim and suspect had business dealings in that county.
Dismissal of Case
Goodwin's attorneys filed a pretrial motion claiming that Orange County was not the proper venue.
The charges in Los Angeles ended Goodwin's hopes of freedom, born when his lawyers won a dismissal of the case.
In late April, a three-judge panel of the 4th District Court of Appeal in Santa Ana unanimously ruled there was no evidence a murder conspiracy took place in Orange County.
The 4th District indicated that Los Angeles district attorney prosecutors had declined to charge Goodwin because of insufficient evidence.
'Danger to Witnesses'
"This is not a prosecution of an accessory to a crime completed in the prosecuting county," Presiding Justice David Sills concluded in the unpublished decision. "To the contrary, the prosecuting county is not connected with the murders at all. That is the problem."
Despite the dismissal, Goodwin remained in jail. Under court rules, the opinion would not be final for 60 days, giving prosecutors time to file an appeal.
Orange County District Attorney Tony Rackauckas decided last week not to appeal the 4th District's findings. Goodwin's attorneys argued for his release, indicating it was unlawful and unjust.
But in court filings, Orange County Deputy District Attorney James Mulgrew countered, "If released, he presents a danger to witnesses and he may flee the country."
Goodwin, 59, said from Orange County jail, where he's been held without bail since December 2001, that he will have to fight the district attorney on his own from now on.
He said he ran out of money seven weeks ago and plans to dismiss Santa Ana lawyer Jeffrey Friedman and Costa Mesa attorney Jeffrey Benice, who have handled the case from the beginning.
"The only way a defendant can have full access to the files in his case is to be pro per," he said. "I want to see all 400,000 pages of discovery. "[The Orange County prosecutors] have scrambled the evidence and made a mess of the case," Goodwin added. He said he would file to be represented by a county public defender only after he reviews the case files.
Thompson was known as the "Speed King" for setting 500 auto speed and endurance records in the 1950s.
He had told friends and associates that he feared for his life and had received several death threats just days before the double slayings.
On March 17, 1988, two gunmen on bicycles killed the auto racing pioneer and his wife, Trudy Thompson, 41, in the driveway of their Spanish-style estate in the San Gabriel Valley hillside community of Bradbury. The suspects have never been caught. The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department said its investigators found nothing to indicate the murders were part of a robbery. In fact, the department said, the investigators did find $4,000 in cash and $10,000 in jewelry on or near the Thompsons' bodies. Goodwin and Thompson had a short but contentious business relationship.
In 1984, Goodwin merged his indoor-stadium motorcycle dirt-track racing business with Thompson's indoor-stadium races with small minitrucks. But after some failed races and a "complete deterioration of their social and business relationship, Thompson sued Goodwin in Los Angeles in 1985," Sills wrote in his opinion.
Thompson prevailed at trial and was awarded $512,000 in May 1986, which grew to $766,000 with attorney fees and interest. Thompson v. Goodwin, C597922 (L.A. Super. Ct., filed 1985). But Goodwin's company filed for bankruptcy, so Thompson never collected the debt. Goodwin also appealed the judgment, which was rejected by the state Supreme Court in 1988. The fallout marked Goodwin as a prime suspect in the slayings.
Goodwin and his attorneys have long said his prosecution is politically motivated, because Rackauckas is a friend of Thompson's sister, Collene Campbell. Goodwin claims he has evidence Orange County district attorneys and the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department have made repeated misstatements and lies about the case."We have files and files of evidence proving this is an illegal, politically motivated prosecution," Goodwin said. He declined to give specifics, saying they will come out in court hearings.
But Assistant Orange County District Attorney David Brent, who had filed the original charges against Goodwin, has denied any pressure to push the case, saying he was given "complete independence." In a statement, Rackauckas commended Los Angeles District Attorney Steve Cooley in filing the case. "Our hearts go out to the families of Mickey and Trudy Thompson, who were brutally murdered outside their home in 1988; they have waited so long for this day to come," he said. "We have faith in the judicial system and believe justice will be served." Los Angeles' decision to file was not unexpected, his attorneys said. Goodwin and his attorneys are not aware of any new evidence in the case. "But you can get a jailhouse snitch to say anything, so I worry about that," Goodwin said.
An arraignment date has not been set. Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies must travel to Orange County to arrest Goodwin, who is in custody there, Los Angeles district attorney representative Sandi Gibbons said.
