Original subtitles

- A mystery worthy of Hollywood,

but tragically it's no fiction.

- Ronni Chasen was one of the most high-profile

and high-powered publicists in all of Hollywood.

Inside Hollywood, she was a towering figure.

- So I would like to dedicate this star in loving memory

to my friend, the great Ronni Chasen.

- She was driving down Sunset to turn left on Whittier Drive.

Four bullets shatter her passenger window.

- The Hollywood blogosphere is consumed

by this real-life whodunit.

- These are the things of which conspiracy theories are made.

- I call this an unsolved murder

because I was never totally convinced.

- What would lead somebody to hire a hitman?

- Maybe she owed money to powerful people.

- There was one theory that Ronni Chasen

was killed over an art deal that went bad.

- We're learning more now about the large fortune

Chasen left behind.

- All roads kinda lead back to the Russian mob.

- They shot her four times, and all four shots hit their target.

- Something just didn't add up.

- They just couldn't find anything.

- This is where we get into some weird stuff, right?

- 911 Emergency.

- The official narrative doesn't tell the whole story.

- But you really have to look at everything.

You still have to go down that rabbit hole.

You still have to go down that path.

- When a celebrity dies, the search for answers moves online,

and the truth may be one click away.

It's just past midnight on November 16, 2010,

in the heart of Beverly Hills.

Suddenly, the sounds of crunching metal

and breaking glass shatter the early-morning silence.

But this is no mere car accident.

The crime is murder.

And when the victim is identified,

all of Hollywood is shocked.

The driver is 64-year-old Ronni Chasen,

publicist to movie stars and studio moguls.

When police arrive at the scene, she is barely alive.

She dies less than an hour later at the hospital.

Ronni Chasen was one of the Hollywood elite.

She was a behind-the-scenes power broker

whose influence rivaled

that of movie stars and studio executives.

I'm Pete Hammond, and I work in the entertainment business.

When she died, it was just such a blow to people.

I always thought that she was a very generous and good person.

- My name is Ryan Katzenbach,

and I am an independent film producer/documentarian.

Ronni definitely moved in a... In an A-list environment.

She was definitely very, very well known.

And she was very good at what she did.

So Ronni grew up a New Yorker,

along with her brother Larry Cohen.

And, of course, Larry, as we know,

became a filmmaker in his own right.

- Her brother Larry Cohen... Kind of protective of her,

I think, growing up.

You know, the big brother, the younger sister.

- In the 1970s, Ronni Cohen arrives in Hollywood

with dreams of becoming an actor.

Instead, she discovers she has a knack for public relations.

Ronni Cohen becomes Ronni Chasen.

She takes her new name from a famous

Beverly Hills restaurant.

During the 1980s and '90s, Ronni Chasen rises

to the upper echelon of the Hollywood publicity elite.

A celebrity among celebrities,

she pulls the strings behind multi-million dollar deals

and blockbuster Oscar campaigns.

- So she became an expert

in the soundtrack business of film composers.

And that was... At that time, nobody specialized in that.

And she had big people, like John Williams,

that were devoted to her.

- I would like to dedicate this star

in loving memory to my friend, the great Ronni Chasen.

- She was really the person who sort of invented the way

that movies and producers campaign for Academy Awards.

- Ronni Chasen's clients accumulate Oscar gold,

and the upward trajectory of her career seems unstoppable...

until one fateful night.

News of Ronni Chasen's death

sends a shock wave through Hollywood.

- This is jaw-droppingly shocking.

I mean, I couldn't believe it.

- My wife and I were just crestfallen.

We were stunned.

It was definitely major, major news in the industry.

There's no question about it.

- While Ronni Chasen's friends and family mourn,

the mystery over her death grows.

Before long, Hollywood

becomes obsessed with Ronni Chasen's murder.

- Movie publicist Ronni Chasen...

- Ronni Chasen... - Ronni Chasen...

- Ronni Chasen... - Ronni Chasen...

- The breaking news of Ronni Chasen's death

was almost as big

as when Sharon Tate was killed by the Manson family

because both crimes were senseless

and both crimes targeted celebrities.

- Adding to the mystery is the fact that

for weeks after the murder,

police announce no suspects, and no motive.

Beverly Hills investigators scramble

to put the pieces of the crime together.

- And the police, in the course of two weeks,

just really came up empty-handed.

They couldn't find anything.

In desperation, Ronni's high-roller friends

offer a reward for information leading

to the arrest and conviction of her murderer.

- Harold Matzner, who is the chairman

of the Palm Springs International Film Festival,

who had worked with Ronni

for many decades, put up a $100,000 reward

for the arrest and conviction of Ronni's killer.

- The reward leads to the first break in the case.

After the money is mentioned on "America's Most Wanted,"

a tipster calls the TV show.

- An individual called "America's Most Wanted,"

stating that he lived in an apartment building

in East Hollywood...

The Harvey Apartments on Santa Monica Boulevard.

And he stated that he had a neighbor

that lived in the building that he felt was acting suspicious,

and that he believed that this individual

was the perpetrator of Ronni Chasen's murder.

So "America's Most Wanted" relayed that phone tip

to the Beverly Hills Police Department.

- Police descend on the dingy Harvey Apartments building.

And then, a shocking twist worthy of a Hollywood movie.

Just as police are about to question the man

identified by the tipster,

he pulls out a gun and shoots himself in the head.

The dead man is identified as Harold Smith,

a petty criminal with a history of robbery.

- And a week later, the Beverly Hills Police Department

holds a press conference,

and they announce that Harold Smith

is the guy that... That committed the crime.

They also state that the gun that he was carrying

was the same gun used to kill Ronni Chasen.

- Police conclude that after riding his bicycle

from Hollywood to Beverly Hills, Harold Smith killed Ronni Chasen

during a botched robbery attempt.

Eight months later, they close the case.

But to Ronni's family and friends,

as well as a legion of Internet investigators,

the police version simply doesn't hold up.

- It made no sense to me.

Just a random act like that?

I call this an unsolved murder

because I was never totally convinced.

This... This... Something just didn't add up.

- Things like this don't happen in Beverly Hills.

You know, Beverly Hills likes to think

that it is this mecca of... of luxury and safety,

that crime like this does not come knocking on their doors.

- A lot of people didn't trust in the, you know,

Beverly Hills mayor's office,

where they want to shut these things up right away.

You have a community of very rich people

who do not want crime running rampant there,

and the police know that.

- So there was great pressure on this department to solve this.

And I feel like they were gonna do whatever they needed to

to bring this case to a close.

- Police consider the murder solved.

But in online chat rooms, conspiracy websites,

and even TikTok videos,

the investigation becomes an obsession.

Theories multiply, claiming that Ronni Chasen

was the victim of a targeted hit...

for family gambling debts...

an art fraud scheme turned deadly...

or for some other reason closer to home.

- My name is Justin Ling.

I am a freelance investigative journalist

who specializes in misinformation,

conspiracy theories, and crazy nonsense.

As an investigative journalist, I obviously have access

to some tools that regular people don't have,

whether that's legal databases, financial databases.

But a lot of the times, investigating is really just

about knowing what to look for, what to ask for.

That can get you some pretty effective results.

Ronni Chasen's death had all the elements of a story

that I could really sink my teeth into.

You have a seemingly random murder,

a quick police investigation that comes up

with only one suspect, who doesn't really fit the bill.

The suspect's dead, so you never actually get a confession.

And on top of that, there's all of these theories

flying around about the real motivation for the murder.

There's really a feeling like justice was never done here

and there's still work that needs doing.

- There are a lot of people that I talk to in this industry

that, like me, don't feel

that the real murderer of Ronni Chasen

has ever been apprehended.

- So my name is Deanna Thompson, and I

am, like, what they would call a "Web sleuth."

And I investigate crimes that happen on the Internet

on my nights and weekends.

My work was featured in a documentary called

"Don't 'F' with Cats."

I have, like, an insatiable thirst

for justice and fairness.

I don't like when people are bullied

or being treated unfairly by the justice system.

Ronni was, like, an A-type personality.

She stood up for her clients, her friends, her family.

She was successful in a really male-dominated industry.

I can totally relate to that,

so I empathize greatly with Ronni.

- As an experienced Internet sleuth,

Deanna often works in secret.

She uses a series of alternate accounts

to observe conversations unfolding online

and to troll for clues.

- So, like, if there's a thread about Ronni Chasen, right,

I'll revive it many years later and say something like,

"So what do you guys really think happened to Ronni Chasen?"

And I'll just, like, kind of, like, light a spark again

to get people talking about it.

- In the case of Ronni Chasen's murder,

Deanna discovers that widespread skepticism

about the case persists, kept alive by Ronni's friends

and by social media.

- Welcome back to Part 3 of the Ronni Chasen case,

and now we're gonna talk about

why the investigation seemed to have been done haphazardly.

- The source of much of the doubt about the case

comes from serious questions

about how the Beverly Hills Police Department

handled the crime scene during their initial investigation.

- So the Beverly Hills Police Department

investigated this crime,

and their lack of investigative skills

when it comes to homicides was evident from the get-go.

Like, when you think of Beverly Hills,

you don't think of murder.

So, they don't have a lot of experience

in investigating homicide.

- We don't have crimes like this in the city of Beverly Hills,

so it is a surprise to us.

We've got numerous investigators at the scene

that are trying to piece this thing together.

- What there is, is a police investigation

that frankly doesn't look complete to me.

- The things that the Beverly Hills Police Department

did not do in the course of this investigation

dealing with ballistics and fingerprints...

It was absolutely shocking to me.

- That is going to raise suspicions

about the case, for sure.

- What happened in the six minutes between the phone call

and when Ronni Chasen was shot?

- Nobody can place Harold Smith at the scene of the crime.

- And that makes me wonder if

there's actually still a suspect out there.

- Superstar publicist Ronni Chasen

has a roster of A-list talent in her pocket

and the keys to Hollywood in her hand.

- When people talk about the Hollywood elite,

picture Ronni Chasen.

- When her meteoric rise is cut short by murder,

the Beverly Hills Police Department

says it's simply a robbery gone bad.

But Internet sleuths suspect

there is more to the case than meets the eye.

In an attempt to come up with their own theories

about what really happened,

cyber detectives turn their attention to the final hours

leading up to Ronni Chasen's death.

Fittingly, her last night on earth

begins with a red-carpet movie premiere.

- So she was at a party

for a movie premiere called "Burlesque."

And she was mingling and talking with people

and generally seen as a jovial person at the party.

- After the premiere, Chasen's next stop

was the afterparty at the W Hollywood Hotel.

It was packed with celebrities, including, amongst others,

Christina Aguilera.

- Around midnight, she left the party

in her 2010 black Mercedes.

She was going home to her apartment on Wilshire Boulevard.

She was driving down Sunset,

and she was planning to turn left on Whittier Drive,

which is, like, a really common Beverly Hills shortcut.

- At 12:22 a.m., she calls her office and leaves instructions

to her staff for the next morning.

- Six minutes or so

after she finished that last phone call

was when Beverly Hills got the phone call

that there had been a solo car collision on Whittier Drive.

And that's when the Beverly Hills Police Department

responded to the scene.

What happened in the six minutes between the phone call

and when Ronni Chasen was shot?

We know very little.

This is the Beverly Hills Police Department's

report number 62 in the file.

It says that Harold Smith approached Ronni Chasen

on the early morning hours of November 16th,

that he may have come up to her for the purpose

of asking her for change or money or whatever,

that Ronni put the window down a few inches,

she said something that pissed him off,

and that he then proceeded to walk around

the car to the passenger side, where he simply walks up

to the passenger side window, produces this .38 handgun,

and shoots her four times.

- So Ronni did not die instantly.

She was able to make the left-hand turn,

and she kind of, like, crashed into, like, a light pole.

So then the neighbors come out,

they see her kind of slumped over.

The police arrive very soon after,

and they don't find a pulse.

She's, like, rushed to Cedars-Sinai Hospital,

and she's pronounced dead at 1:12 a.m.

- The official police report seems compelling... at first.

But to trained cyber investigators,

there are serious shortcomings in this version of events.

- I'm a true crime author, and I'm a criminal investigator

for my local sheriff's department.

My background is in Army counterintelligence.

I also have experience and training in forensic science

and criminal justice.

Generally the first couple days after a murder occurs

are the most important in the investigation.

It's your best chance of finding witnesses,

of finding video surveillance, of getting tips.

Within those first couple days,

the Beverly Hills P.D. had no solid leads.

They had no suspects.

- After two weeks, few details are released to the public.

It seems as if the investigation has already hit a dead end.

- Ronni's murder came across as almost a purely random event.

- As Internet sleuths scrutinize the evidence,

cracks begin to appear in the police account,

starting with their handling of the crime scene.

In fact, it appears some rudimentary

investigative procedures weren't followed.

- In the documents that were released,

there was no mention of them

dusting the passenger side of her car for fingerprints.

- So they didn't investigate the scene properly.

They didn't properly document information.

They didn't take video evidence of the scene.

They didn't fingerprint the car.

They just didn't process the scene properly.

So, when you miss that first step,

like, this really important step in the investigation,

everything that comes after it is suspect.

- As cyber detectives delve deeper

into the police version of events,

even more doubts come to light.

For example, the police claim that Harold Smith's motive

was robbery.

But nothing was stolen.

- We have photos from the crime scene.

Her purse is literally just sitting there

on the passenger seat.

It would have taken, like, seconds to grab.

And he didn't.

- It just seemed so weird, you know.

Why wouldn't they rob her?

Why wouldn't they take stuff?

- But the biggest blow to the police version of events

is the fact that not a single eyewitness

can place Harold Smith

anywhere near the scene of the crime.

- And not one camera anywhere caught Harold Smith.

It's Beverly Hills, okay?

There's surveillance cameras every 3 feet.

I find that very suspicious.

- So you have this black man in Beverly Hills in 2010

at 12:30 at night riding his bike down Sunset Boulevard,

and literally nobody saw it?

He would have stood out like a sore thumb.

A black man standing around with a bike

in this very affluent area of Los Angeles...

It never would have happened.

And it's disgusting to... to say that,

but that's just the society we live in.

- In fact, the only evidence police have that links

Harold Smith to the murder is the gun found in his hand

at the time of his suicide.

- They found those Hydra-Shok bullets

loaded in the gun that Harold shot himself with.

These are bullets, hollow-point bullets.

The point is literally hollow.

And, of course, when it comes in contact with bone and tissue,

it opens up like this for the purpose of doing

as much damage as possible.

I mean, if you shoot somebody with a hollow-point bullet,

your intention is to kill them.

They also found those bullets present in Ronni's body

when they did the autopsy.

- It looks like a strong connection.

But Hydra-Shok is a popular type of ammunition.

And the police ballistics report can't say for sure

that the gun found on Harold Smith

is a match for the weapon used to kill Ronni Chasen.

- The ballistics report is not entirely conclusive, okay?

It's... The language in it is something, like, "You know,

this gun could have fired that bullet.

It could have fired this caliber of bullet."

But it doesn't distinctly say, "Yes,

this is a 100% absolute match."

- With so many questions hanging over the case,

it seems baffling police

would declare Ronni Chasen's murder solved.

- So we're to believe that he managed to find a firearm,

that he was a perfect shot,

that he managed to steal exactly nothing, yet left a woman dead.

And that's the explanation we get?

- There's a phrase called "confirmation bias,"

and that occurs when an investigator kind of latches

onto a particular suspect

and they will take in information

that supports their theory and supports their suspect.

And that makes me wonder if other information got ignored

or pushed aside

and if there's actually still a suspect out there.

- My name is Myrl Stebens.

I've been doing criminal defense investigations since 1980.

I've been practicing as a licensed investigator

and forensics expert in Fresno County since 1988.

If you was to take this to trial,

and you had an impartial, truly impartial jury,

a good defense attorney,

there is reasonable doubt

as to whether Harold actually did this or not.

To me, it was a... A glossed-over investigation

by Beverly Hills Police Department

to get it off the front page.

- With doubts undermining the official narrative

that Ronni Chasen's murder

was simply a tragically bungled robbery,

Internet sleuths investigate an alternative explanation...

That Chasen was possibly the victim of a professional hit.

- It was a nice, steady gunshot... bam, bam.

It wasn't somebody that was a novice with a weapon.

- All four shots hit their target.

- Did someone hand Harold this gun thinking or hoping

the murder would get pinned on him?

- In Hollywood, Ronni Chasen's celebrity rivals

that of movie stars.

When she is murdered, police say it's simply case

of robbery gone bad,

but her friends and family believe

there is more to the story than meets the eye.

- It seemed like a random crime

because that's the way they painted it.

A lot of people didn't trust

in the Beverly Hills mayor's office,

where they want to shut these things up right away,

find a culprit,

bring them to justice quickly, and calm the community.

That's the way of the world in Beverly Hills.

- After carefully scrutinizing the police version of events,

Internet detectives take their search online...

and discover evidence that points not to a robbery,

but to the work of a professional hitman.

- At first, I thought, "Nah.

Like, let me tackle

that theory and disprove that one first.

It seems the easiest to disprove."

The problem was, I couldn't disprove it.

Whoever shot Ronni meant to kill her.

They shot her four times, and all four shots hit their target.

The four shots to her body tell us the shooter had intent

to kill the person in that driver's seat.

- It was alleged at that time

that this was not a professional hit

because of the number... The placement

of the injury sites on her chest.

But when I looked at it, I looked at it differently.

And the shot group were... Was really tight in particular

around her shoulder area,

the entrance, and then the exit wounds on her back,

and then across to her breast areas.

That demonstrated to me that it was a nice,

steady gunshot... bam, bam.

- The shot pattern that... that Ronni endured was here,

here, here, and here, through the breasts and into the arm,

you know, and that was a very tight cluster.

And...

that would seem to indicate, you know,

somebody who is a professional sharpshooter,

somebody who's definitely got a background in firearms,

someone who probably goes to the firing range

and keeps that skill very honed.

- I go to the gun range

probably once a week.

And if I can have the kind of accuracy

that is portrayed in Ronni's pattern,

then I'm doing pretty good.

So for me, the person shooting the weapon has some experience.

- The hitman theory raises the possibility that Harold Smith,

if, in fact, he was present at the crime scene,

wasn't simply a robber, but a hired assassin.

- So the idea of this hit is, either there was

a professional assassin who was dispatched to kill Chasen

or somebody paid Smith to do it, knowing

they probably wouldn't be linked back to it.

In fact, some of Smith's neighbors

say that he was bragging about the hit

and that he had been paid $10,000 to do it.

- He was telling my husband, "Someone hired me.

And I'm just getting a big payoff.

And I'll be expecting $10,000."

- But to experts, the idea that Harold Smith

was a hitman sounds absurd.

- My name is Jay Albanese. I am a criminologist.

I specialize in the study of organized crime and corruption.

He was low-rent.

He was not, you know, in that category.

He clearly didn't belong to any organized crime group,

was not affiliated in any way, all right?

That would be the first case in the history of organized crime

committed by a felon on a bicycle,

because obviously in that line of work,

you always have to have an escape route.

And a bicycle is a pretty horrible escape route.

- Harold Smith was just...

He was a burglar. He was a robber.

He spent quite a bit of time in prison for doing so.

He seemed pretty desperate for money,

at least by all accounts from, like, the people that knew him.

He was often bragging

that he was going to be getting a... a payout soon.

He did not want to go back to prison.

He made that very clear with... In talking with people

that he knew.

- The other thing about this that you have to remember

is that...

if the gun that Harold had was the gun used

to kill Ronni Chasen,

we have no idea when he got it.

We have no idea if he picked that gun up that afternoon.

We have nothing that proves that he had that gun

for any duration of time.

Did someone hand Harold this gun

thinking or hoping the murder would get pinned on him?

- By closely reviewing the crime scene photos,

independent investigators

discover an even more disturbing possibility.

- When you look at his right hand,

he has the weapon in the palm of his hand

with the butt of the weapon in the palm of his hand.

That's not how you fall.

That... That... Pull the trigger here. Relax.

He's not gonna grip that all the way down to the ground.

And even on impact, that gun is gonna bounce.

So there's a lot of questions that... that I have about

that particular reported incident.

- So there is some maybe speculation that the detective

shot Harold Smith and, like, planted the gun.

- Even the gun has a shady past.

- The gun that Harold Smith used allegedly to kill himself,

that is also the gun that allegedly killed

Ronni Chasen, belonged to a former LAPD officer.

We don't know what the confrontation looked like

between the police department and Harold Smith.

- We actually know from some of the investigative files

that police did pursue the idea that gambling debt

may have been involved in Chasen's death.

- Ronni Chasen is a publicist to the stars

and a Hollywood celebrity in her own right.

After she is gunned down, independent investigators

make a shocking discovery

about the weapon police claim was used in her murder.

- The gun that Harold Smith supposedly had in his possession

at the time of his suicide...

The gun belonged to a retired LAPD officer.

- An LAPD officer's home was... was burglarized,

and his gun was stolen.

So there is some maybe speculation

that they shot Harold...

You know, the detective shot Harold Smith

and, like, planted the gun.

- I mean, was Harold a patsy?

- There's no evidence of that.

But because the Beverly Hills Police Department has been

so secretive with the information,

it just kind of fuels those conspiracy theories.

- It made it seem to others that Smith, a black man,

was an easy scapegoat since he had a previous criminal record

and spent almost two decades in prison.

- There was a surveillance camera

in the lobby of the apartment complex

that Harold Smith killed himself at.

But the footage has never been released,

so we don't know what the confrontation looked like

between the police department and Harold Smith.

- After repeated attempts, Beverly Hills Police Department

has still never released to me the surveillance footage

from the lobby that shows that suicide,

if, in fact, it was a suicide.

- While there is no evidence Harold Smith was a mob assassin,

some online commentators continue to speculate

that a professional killer might have been responsible

for Ronni Chasen's murder.

- So whenever you're investigating the possibility

that something was a professional hit,

you want to look for a couple of things.

You know, why would somebody want them dead?

But also why would someone want to pay for it?

There has to be pretty big stakes on the table

in order for this level of risk and cost to be worth it.

- Ronni didn't do anything other than work.

I mean, she just worked.

The woman never... Never stopped working, you know.

And that's the thing.

I mean, why would anyone want to kill her?

- So when police did these background checks on Chasen,

they didn't really find anything.

She was, by all accounts, squeaky clean.

There was no mob connections, no huge pile of gambling debt.

It just did not seem like anyone would want her dead.

- Ronni Chasen might have had a spotless record,

but some online commentators speculate

that someone close to her might have owed

the mob half-a-million dollars in unpaid gambling debts.

- We actually know from some of the investigative files

that police did pursue the idea that gambling debt

may have been involved in Chasen's death.

In fact, they honed in on Larry Cohen, Chasen's brother.

They'd asked him about whether or not he owed

any significant amount of money because of gambling.

- Much of the gambling in Los Angeles

is known to be controlled

by a particularly brutal faction of organized crime.

- I've reported on a lot of high-profile

crime stories over the years.

Everything from serial killers,

to unsolved disappearances,

to organized crime writ large.

It's pretty well known that the Russian mob controls

most of the gambling in L.A.

So, if there were any significant debts

that got incurred, chances are the Russian mob

would be the ones coming to collect.

So when the mob needs to collect money it believes they're owed,

and they can't shake down the person

who's actually racked up the debts,

sometimes they will turn to friends or family members

who might be good for the money.

The idea here goes that Chasen became the de facto person

responsible for this possible debt

and that the mob wanted their money from her.

Following this theory, it is possible

that they had her killed.

- Larry Cohen, who died in 2019 of natural causes,

strongly denied ever having gambling debts.

- Now, he has flatly denied this

both to police and in the public,

saying he doesn't play poker, he doesn't play slots,

he doesn't gamble at all.

But nevertheless, the idea that there was potentially

hundreds of thousands of dollars

in money owed to the mob, it's lingered.

- Without hard evidence, the theory that Larry Cohen

or someone else close to Ronni Chasen owed the mob money

for gambling debts remains mere speculation.

And there is another problem with the gambling debt theory.

- Organized crime doesn't tend to go straight to murder.

When you start killing people and their families,

they don't tend to be more willing

to give you the money they owe you.

That tends to be a final point,

not a starting of the negotiations.

- The only time a murder would occur

is to set examples for others.

So the motive would be very plain to anybody.

Otherwise, it has no point, because you would only do it

for, you know, a deterrent purpose

within the... The loan-sharking world.

- With no evidence or leads,

the gambling theory seems to hit a dead end.

But as independent investigators continue to sift

through media reports and Internet chatter,

they discover another theory spreading online.

- Ronni had expensive taste, and she surrounded herself with,

like, this really beautiful, exquisite art.

- After her death, some of Chasen's friends told media

they believed that she was killed

because of an art deal gone south.

A lot of art deals go down in cash,

which, of course, is preferred by organized crime.

- Ronni Chasen was an art collector,

and that is a known fact, for sure.

- These are the things of which conspiracy theories are made.

- Ronni Chasen is

a behind-the-scenes Hollywood puppetmaster,

guiding careers and directing Oscar campaigns.

- Ronni Chasen was a big celebrity

in the celebrity circle.

So she was famous to famous people.

- When she is murdered, Internet sleuths explore

the theory she was the victim of a professional hit

and look for a possible motive.

- After her death, some of Chasen's friends told media

they believed that she was killed

because of an art deal gone south.

We've known for many years that organized crime

loves to push dirty money through shady art deals.

So why would the Russian mob be interested in art?

Well, there's a couple of possible reasons.

I mean, for one, if you're the mob

and you have a piece of stolen art or counterfeit art,

if you put it through an intermediary,

somebody who has cachet,

someone who's kind of high profile,

neither the buyer, nor the cops,

are probably gonna look too closely at that transaction.

The other thing about art is that it has no set price.

So it's potentially a great vehicle to move money

that you may have earned illicitly,

like through drug dealing.

A lot of art deals go down in cash,

which, of course, is preferred by organized crime.

- $30,000 cash is a big burden

because you can't go into a car dealership

and buy a car with it, right?

They have to report big cash, right?

It'd be much easier to buy a piece of art

because generally it would be a private exchange.

It wouldn't involve a bank.

So that would make it easier to launder that money.

Then you hold on to it for a while,

and then you would sell the art at some auction somewhere.

- It's possible that Chasen found herself

on the wrong end of one of those deals.

- Adding fuel to this theory online

is the fact that Ronni Chasen's connection to the art world

isn't simply business...

It's personal.

- Ronni Chasen had a very good friend

who was a very prominent,

very well-known art dealer in Los Angeles.

She always had nice art in her in her condo

because he would loan her art

and she would hang it in her condo for a few weeks

or a few months until he needed it back for his gallery,

and then he would replace it with a new piece.

- It naturally suggests that he may have some knowledge

about what happened.

Police looked into him on the possibility

that he could have been the one behind it,

but nothing turned up.

- But while this theory hits a wall,

there's a tantalizing coincidence

that suggests to some that an art deal

may have played a role in Chasen's murder.

- Some people have pointed out the irony in the fact

that Harold Smith shares a name

with one of the most famous detectives

who investigated art theft.

- That Harold Smith was an insurance company detective

who investigated the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum robbery

in 1990.

Nearly half-a-billion dollars worth of fine art was stolen.

The robbery was never solved

and remains the largest art heist in history.

- Yeah, the fact that the name was the same

is... is interesting.

And these are the things of which conspiracy theories

are made.

However, I haven't seen any link between that Harold Smith,

the former detective involved in art theft,

and the Harold Smith who allegedly killed Ronni Chasen.

- Harold Smith shares a name with a famous detective

who investigated art theft.

But so do thousands of other Harold Smiths

across the country.

- To independent investigators, the art-deal-gone-bad theory

seems to be nothing more than Internet speculation.

- There's absolutely no evidence

or no validity to that rumor whatsoever.

- One of the biggest indicators that Chasen was not involved

in some shady art dealing

is the fact that of her whole collection,

which is pretty impressive,

not a single piece was worth more than $30,000.

No one's ever been able to provide any details

to back up this theory beyond some rampant speculation.

- While there may not be enough evidence to support the theory

that Ronni Chasen was murdered over an art deal gone bad,

the topic of her financial worth raises a new

and intriguing rabbit hole for the online investigators...

That Ronni Chasen was killed for her money.

- The media reported that Ronni was worth $6.1 million,

okay, which is, of course, a substantial amount of money.

But the reality is, is that Ronni was worth more than that,

considerably more than that.

- There's been some media reports that her brother Larry Cohen

believed that shortly before her death,

Ronni changed her will.

- One of her nieces got quite the snub.

She only got $10 from Chasen's estate.

Some people think there may have been a grudge.

- After Hollywood insider Ronni Chasen

is brutally gunned down

in what police claim is a botched robbery,

she leaves a fortune of more than $6 million.

- Ronni did very, very well in her life.

She did well for herself.

She was very wealthy at the time that she was murdered.

And in any homicide case,

you have to look at the people closest to the victim,

and you have to look at who got the money.

- Who stands to benefit from the death?

And the first place you would look

would be at... At legal documents.

She had a family, she had insurance.

She had a will.

Yeah, you'd want to be looking very carefully

at all of those potential beneficiaries.

- Ronni was married once when she was young,

but it didn't last long, and she never remarried.

She had a niece that she adored,

but she didn't have any children of her own.

- Ronni Chasen actually has two nieces...

Daughters of her brother Larry Cohen.

She left the bulk of her fortune to one niece,

but considerably less to the other.

- One thing that arose suspicion

after Chasen's death was her will.

One of her nieces got quite the snub.

She only got $10 from Chasen's estate.

That led to some people think there may have been a grudge.

- She left Melissa the entire residue of her estate, you know.

So Jill got $10, and Melissa basically got everything else.

That would probably sting a little bit, yeah.

- The reason for the unequal division in the will

is shrouded in mystery.

But it is unusual enough that the police interview Jill Gatsby

about her relationship with her aunt.

Jill Gatsby publicly states

she does not bear her late aunt any ill will,

and there seems to be no evidence suggesting otherwise.

- So in a letter to the website Showbiz411,

Jill Gatsby stated,

"As for the $10, that's a real family secret

regarding Ronni and my career as a writer,

which I am choosing to keep to myself at this time.

Perhaps one day the whole truth will be told.

But for now, it's time to mourn and pray

"that whoever did this is brought to justice."

- Ultimately, speculation

that the unequal inheritance in Ronni Chasen's will

might have some connection to her murder leads nowhere.

- There's really nothing supporting it.

It is just another dead end

in a perplexing and frustrating story.

- But to some people following the case,

there remains yet another twist.

Online commentators wonder if a second version

of Chasen's will might exist.

- There's been some media reports that her brother Larry Cohen

believed that shortly before her death,

Ronni changed her will.

- Larry Cohen, Chasen's brother,

seemed to believe that Chasen had amended her will

shortly before her death and it had gone missing.

Friends backed up this idea,

saying that Chasen had talked pretty openly about changing

her will in the months before her death,

but it never really appeared.

It really seems to be yet another loose end

in a story that is full of them.

- Like many of the theories

swirling around Ronni Chasen's murder,

the topic of her will raises fascinating questions,

but provides no definitive answers.

- The troubling part of the Ronni Chasen murder

is the fact that we have no idea who committed it.

- What there is, is a police investigation

that frankly doesn't look complete to me.

And I can imagine that her family and her friends

probably still have a lot of questions

about what really happened

because the official narrative,

this idea of a random killing, it doesn't quite fit.

Police might call it solved,

but I guarantee you a lot of people

who cared about Chasen don't consider this case closed.

- In November 2022, The Hollywood Reporter posted an article,

and it was kind of like a call to action

to reopen the Ronni Chasen case.

There is such a feeling

that justice has not been done for Ronni Chasen.

And, you know, this article coming out 12 years

after her murder really just proves

and gives credibility to that fact.

Her family and friends and Ronni herself deserve some justice.

- In order to do right by Ronni, who's the victim in this case,

I do think the murder needs to be re-examined.

- I personally do not feel justice was completely done

for Ronni Chasen,

and I hope someday it will be.

- What gnaws at me in this story

is justice.

This woman who was doing nothing wrong,

she met a horrific fate that she did not deserve.

I would like to see justice for her.

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