All language subtitles for The.Wonderland.Massacre.and.The.Secret.History.of.Hollywood.S01E03.1080p.HEVC.x265-MeGusta

♪♪

[Michael] Los Angeles,

a city infamous
for its music and movies...

[director] Action!

...is also defined
by its murders.

[gunshot fires, man screams]

It seems to set
the City of Angels apart,

capturing
the world's attention.

The randomness of murder
plays out beneath

the bright lights
of Hollywood,

the boulevard
of broken dreams,

and seeps into the veins
of the American zeitgeist.

I'm Michael Connelly, and I
came here nearly 40 years ago,

drawn by the movies, the music,
and, yes, the murders.

This dark pantheon includes
the Black Dahlia,

the Hillside Strangler,
the Manson case,

the OJ Simpson case,
the slaying of Biggie Smalls,

just to name a few.

But perhaps no other case

symbolizes
an era in Los Angeles

more than
the Wonderland Massacre.

[man] Okay, cameras rolling.

[reporter] Four murder victims
were found today

in a posh
Hollywood Hills home.

Police said all four had been
beaten to death in a struggle

that splattered the interior
of the house with blood --

a Manson-like mass murder.

[Michael]
The tentacles of the case

would ensnare a porn star,
a corrupt judge,

and drug kingpin Pablo Escobar.

Multiple celebrities
would be swept into the story

by Liberace's boy toy,
enigma Scott Thorson.

♪♪

To this day, no one has been
held directly accountable.

For many, including me,

it has been
a decades-long obsession.

♪♪

♪♪

[vehicles passing,
indistinct conversations]

[car horn honks]

♪♪

[Richard Pryor] Listen,
addiction, it's a monster.

Well, I'll tell you one thing,
man.

When that fire hits your ass,

that will sober your ass up
quickly.

[cheers and applause]

[Michael] What was
your interaction with Pryor?

Isn't there a story
about you warning Pryor

about the dangers
of freebasing?

Oh, yeah.

♪♪

We took off and went
to Mulholland Drive.

And we parked
my gold Rolls-Royce,

and he went in the back.
-[lighter strikes]

We had trays
that would fold down.

And he was freebasing,
and he'd light that pipe up.

Yeah, he even worked it
into his act.

You got a light? Match?

-Thank you.
-[man] Don't do it!

[chuckles]
Say, watch out.

And it was
an ether base,

so I said, "You got to be
careful, Richard."

And, uh, he didn't listen,
and he blew himself up.

Just strike the match like this.
You say, "What's that?"

"Richard Pryor running down
the street."

[laughter and applause]

And, uh, that's when...

it just exploded
in Los Angeles.

[man] Deputy District Attorney
Jan Maurizi.

You were a prosecutor
of murders and major crimes

in L.A. County in the 1980s,

so you kinda had
a front row seat

on what was happening
in the worlds of crime,

and especially this advent
of crack cocaine.

In the '70s and early '80s,
powder cocaine was king.

♪♪

But it was more the drug
of choice for the elite,

so it was sort of that segment
of the population

in those early days.

By the early 1980s,

they wanted an opportunity
and the ability

to increase profitability,

and so they came up with a way
to create crack cocaine.

Crack cocaine
was something

that they could take a
small amount of powder cocaine,

mix it with baking soda
and water,

and cook it
at a high temperature

until it sort of crystallized
and became crack.

And then when it cooled,
they could break off the rocks

so they could sell them
to the population.

Their cost was much less.
They had much more product.

And that's when I saw it
going into

the lower and sort of
middle class communities.

So that's when
the epidemic really took off,

the early to mid '80s.

[reporter] Crack -- a kind of
cocaine, a powerful mind bender

and increasingly popular
and deadly.

[reporter #2]
Today, crack cocaine use here

is an epidemic,
up 200% in the last year.

Good evening.

Drugs are menacing
our society.

They're threatening
our values

and undercutting
our institutions.

Today, there's a drug
and alcohol abuse epidemic,

in this country,
and no one is safe from it.

The casual user cannot
morally escape responsibility

for the action of
drug traffickers and dealings.

There's a trail of death
and destruction

that leads directly
to his door.

I like these glasses.
They're nice.

Tell me about
the wave of crack

that came
to Los Angeles.

Eddie Nash was
the granddaddy of crack.

He introduced it
to Hollywood.

He sold it through
the nightclubs.

He had me making the crack.
I would do the cooking for him.

We would cook in these
big gallon mayonnaise jars,

and they're called "the cookie."
"Make the cookie."

And then cut them up,
and then we'd sell them

through the nightclubs
and all that.

You guys were involved
in crack so early

that law enforcement
didn't really understand

what was going on
with that.

♪♪

One day, I was driving,

and I was going up
to Eddie Nash,

and I had
this big, round rock...

[siren wails]

...and I was pulled over
and they searched the car.

And they said,
"What the hell is this?"

And they put it
on the hood of the car.

I said, "I don't know. I found
that in my brother's house."

I was going to point to it,
and he slapped my hand,

and the crack went flying
off the hood of the car.

They didn't know
what was up.

It wasn't until, um,
the gang members,

the Bloods, the Crips,
started selling it.

Here, off an ounce of dope,

I can make anywhere
from $1,100 to $1,200.

And then we're killing
each other over it.

[man] Another guy hit
over there, too.

[man #2] We know about him.
He's just his leg.

That's...That's what
started it all.

This guy's hit in the chest.

It's real bad.

People dying
over nothing, man.

So your 10, 11 years
in Hollywood

matched the rise
of crack cocaine.

-Yeah.
-...and that epidemic

that really destroyed
certain levels of society.

The drug trade is bringing in
gobs and gobs of money,

and everybody's got guns

because they're carrying
a lot of money.

They're carrying
a lot of drugs.

There's protection,
and both sides have that.

It's ripe for shootouts
and -- and murders.

And -- And the same thing
was going on

in Hollywood
at that time.

It just -- All the pieces
of the puzzle

were there to be put together
to explode with violence.

And I got brought in
to the homicide unit

just to help try
to control the problem.

♪♪

[camera shutter clicking]

[Michael] The granddaddy
of this crack epidemic,

Eddie Nash, was facing trial
for the drug charges

that resulted
from the cocaine found

during the raids
of his home and businesses.

Were there any special
challenges on the drug trial,

or did you feel like
you were going in,

uh, to get that victory?

It's a bread-and-butter
trial.

There's just nothing
that could be raised.

Drugs are found
in is safe in the house.

Diles shoots
at the deputy sheriffs.

I wasn't sweating this
too badly.

Anytime you're dealing with
12 jurors, nothing is assured.

Not wanting to leave
anything to chance,

in a bold move,
Eddie Nash approached

Tom Lange and Bob Souza.

[Souza] Nash actually
attempted to bribe Tom and I

in the courthouse

20 feet from his attorneys.

He said, "Hey,
you guys are homicide guys.

What's it gonna take to
make this go away, you know?

I got to get rid of
these drug cases.

How about a quarter
of a million each?"

And when we heard that,
we thought,

"How many people
can you buy

for a quarter of a million
dollars in 1982?"

And, you know, I mean,

he had to have a lot of people
on the street.

[indistinct conversations]

[reporter] The jury deliberated
for less than a day.

And when the verdict
was read this morning,

Eddie Nash didn't seem
surprised.

He was found guilty of seven
counts of possessing drugs,

two of those counts
with intent to sell --

each a felony.

[Michael]
Judge Rix sentenced Nash

to the maximum
of eight years...

[cell door clanking]

...plus a fine
of more than $120,000.

At this point, Scott Thorson
was merely a name

that had been passed
to investigators

by the sheriff's department,

which had Nash's house
under surveillance

prior to
the Wonderland murders.

Thorson was seen,
along with many others,

going into the house,
presumably to buy drugs.

We'd heard of
Scott Thorson because,

uh, we knew that he was
at Nash's place early on.

Somebody
that we wanted to talk to.

Well,
he wouldn't talk to us.

Everybody kept coming to me,
and I wouldn't --

I wouldn't talk about it.

[chuckles] I --
I was scared to death.

I knew too much.

So about sometime in '82,
he goes off...

-To prison.
-...to prison,

so what
were you doing then?

When he went to jail,

I then took over and I became
involved in running drugs.

I became a big Hollywood
drug lord myself.

I went into another
organized crime family

with the -- called the BGF,
the Black Guerilla Family.

I was
the only white member there.

And we ran coke --
crack houses.

♪♪

When Eddie was gone,
did you kind of

forge new bonds?

You're with a couple people

that were
Black Guerilla Family.

This was like a whole
new distribution branch

for the Eddie Nash
operation?

Oh, yeah.
Yeah, this was huge.

[Michael]
The Black Guerilla Family.

-[Rick] Right.
-Can you kind of explain

who and what
that organization is?

Yeah, it's, uh, it's one
of the main four prison gangs.

It started in California,
like so many gangs do.

And it was
a Black Power gang in prison.

Was it surprising that
here's this guy, Scott Thorson,

he's a white guy,

and he's involved
with the Black Guerilla Family?

-Right.
-Is that an unusual thing,

or is it --
when it comes to drugs,

is --
everyone's welcome?

With Scott Thorson,

he had some prominent
connections through Liberace.

There were people
from all layers of society

that were using cocaine
back then.

It -- It didn't matter.

And if
they could infiltrate

through a guy
like Scott Thorson,

who had pretty decent
connections, that would work.

♪♪

[Michael] But the BGF didn't
start as a drug operation.

The Black Guerilla Family
started in the late 1960s

in the prison system
as a paramilitary organization,

um,
very politically involved.

George Jackson
was the founder.

Here in prison,
we see the repression,

the exploitation,

the -- the victimization of, uh,

lower-class peoples.

Jackson was very Marxist
and Leninist in his philosophy,

much like the SLA
and the Black Panthers.

And so that,
as I understand it,

was part of
the original beginnings.

[indistinct shouting]

[reporter]
Tension had been mounting here

at San Quentin Prison
for several months.

On Saturday, August 21st,

George Jackson was shot
in circumstances

which are,
to say the least, mysterious.

George Jackson
was killed.

So at that time,

a man by the name
of Doc Holiday took over,

and he had already had
a drug business in Pasadena.

And so he began
to expand sort of the goals

of the Black Guerilla Family
into more profit making.

[Michael] How did you
meet Doc Holiday?

Doc Holiday I met
through a friend of mine

that was a Blood.

Doc Holiday
went in partnership with me,

and we took over these
abandoned apartment buildings.

We turned them
into crack houses.

It was the BGF and Bloods that
worked together in these homes.

[Jan] One of the things
that the BGF did

that was really
pretty unique was

there are Bloods,
and there are Crips,

and they are
natural enemies.

They were then.
They are today.

But the Black Guerilla Family
was able

to recruit both of them.

♪♪

[Scott] They'd be on the
rooftops with walkie talkies,

looking for police or any
trouble that would come to them.

-So it was like a whole system.
-There's a whole system.

We had two -- two of

the biggest apartment
buildings in Hollywood.

We'd have people lined up
for over a block.

So you're in business
with these guys.

You're not scared that...

-I was scared to death.
-I mean, you're also an addict,

so it sounds like...
-I was so far gone by then.

So far gone.
I was just out of control.

I was a mess.
I slept with one eye open.

♪♪

[Michael]
I remember when I first put

the words
"Black Guerilla Family"

into a newspaper story.

We had barely written about it
at the LA Times.

I thought it was an ego thing.

I felt like the prince
of the city.

I'd be driving home
over the elevated freeways

over Hollywood,
and I'd look out at the lights

and say,
"These things are going on,

and do all those people
behind those lights,

do they even care,
do they know about it?"

By the early 1980s,

the increased population
of people

who are addicted to drugs,
it just all escalated.

The rise of crack,
if you will,

did that coincide
with the rise of violent crime?

Most definitely.
Most definitely.

[siren wailing
police radio chatter]

Stabbed three times.
Then shot one time.

Left femur,
one entrance wound, no exit.

[man] Yeah, there's
another fella here

that was where he was shot,
shot in the face. He's dead.

And then we started to see

multiple murders throughout
the Black Guerilla Family

and throughout
the San Fernando Valley,

which ultimately led up
to the quadruple murder

that I'm most familiar with.

♪♪

By the time we had
put together this quadruple,

we had
58 murder books.

You keep mentioning
a quadruple,

and you're not talking
about Wonderland, right?

That's correct. I'm not.

That was a quadruple homicide
that took place

that the Bryant Organization
had orchestrated.

You call it
the Bryant Organization,

but this was an organization
that answered to Doc Holiday.

Through Jeff Bryant.

Jeff Bryant ordered
hits on people.

Yes. Two of
the Bryant associates,

James Brown and Andre Armstrong,
got together.

They decided that
the Bryants owed them,

and they were
gonna demand their due.

When they set up
a meeting with them

at one of the crack houses
in Lakeview Terrace...

...unfortunately, they
brought Andre's girlfriend,

and she had two little kids
with her --

a three-year-old daughter
and a one-year-old son.

[Michael] As the two associates
entered the crack house,

they were shot
at point-blank range.

[gunshot fires]

Waiting outside in the car,
the girlfriend and her daughter

were both shot in the back
of the head.

[gunshots fire]

♪♪

Four people were killed
in Lakeview Terrace.

I wrote about it a lot,
but I never knew what --

if my stories
had any impact

or increased the knowledge
of the community

of what's going on
about this cancer

that was at the center
of the community.

Here you have
a quadruple murder

that's not getting
a whole lot of attention.

Then the flip side is Wonderland
is still a crime of fascination.

It's kind of hit
the upper pantheon

of famous
Los Angeles crimes.

I certainly remember
just as a citizen

reading about that --
multiple murders,

drugs, Laurel Canyon,
and porn stars.

But it really wasn't

until I began to see this --
sort of the correlation

between
the elite powder cocaine

and then the lower-class,
middle-class crack cocaine,

and how they were sort of

two sides of the same coin,
in a sense.

[man]
What are you doing?

Smoking some crack.
'Cause I like it.

[man] I love cocaine,

and I couldn't wait
to get out of college

and start working
and making money

'cause I wanted to live
that lifestyle.

[man #2] You don't become known
smoking crack.

You become shit.

Who's buying it?

People, man.
Who you think?

The stockbrokers,
the lawyers,

the people
with the money.

It's not --
It's not a party

unless there's drugs
or drinking.

[chuckles]

I don't know why I do it.

Maybe the addiction.

♪♪

The addiction
is what it is.

♪♪

It was horrible.

That drug,
it makes people evil.

It's one of the worst drugs
I've ever done.

People lose their lives
over this.

They become insane.

They become tweakers,
and that's all they want

is that drug,
and they chase it.

They will sell their mother's
ass on the street if they could.

And they would.

I had a lady
come up to me one day,

and she had
two little babies.

She offered to
sell her babies to me.

I said, "How dare you?

How could you do that
to your own children?"

-It broke my heart.
-And you say that now,

but when this was
all happening in the '80s,

and Los Angeles had

the highest rate of homicide
it's ever had...

Yeah.

...you're cooking this stuff.
Did it never --

Did you make that connection,
or did you say...

-You know something?
-..."What did we start?"

I was so far gone
and making so much money.

I'm not proud of it,
and I have regrets.

But I did it to survive.

♪♪

[Michael]
As the drug wars raged,

and with the Holmes acquittal
long in the rearview mirror,

the Wonderland case
was at a standstill.

♪♪

♪♪

[man] Mitzi Roberts,
LAPD cold case detective. Mark.

When you, um,
look at a cold case,

there's something like 6,000
unsolved murders in Los Angeles.

What is the protocol
or what is the checklist

that you're looking for
in order to open up a case

that's 43 years old?

There's really
no checklist.

I mean, obviously,
if it's self-initiated,

I'm going to try and find
a case that has evidence

that's gonna solve the case --
DNA, fingerprints.

Now, with genetic genealogy,
I mean, that's the game changer.

That's the face of --
of investigations,

especially cold cases.

I've always known about
the Wonderland murders,

the Laurel Canyon murders.

To our benefit,
it's a hands-on crime.

It's not like a shooting.

It's not like, you know,
an execution with a gun.

So every time they're
coming down, um, if there's --

Blood's flying.
Blood, blood, blood.

Even then, you're gonna need
a lot of circumstantial evidence

from other people
that were there.

Does the history
of the case also,

uh, not intimidate,
but give you pause?

Yeah, it -- it does
give me pause,

because some of
the best detectives and DAs

that I've known in my career

have already put everything
into this case.

So why is this case
still so interesting

that people want to know
about it?

Why is this case still
in the zeitgeist?

First of all,
people love Hollywood

all throughout the country,

and this is
a great Hollywood mystery.

It's like the Black Dahlia.

As someone who makes up
a lot of my stories,

yeah, having a good villain
is important.

I think Eddie Nash emerged
as a really good villain.

-Yeah.
-And of course,

it's somebody who,
our villain,

a real life villain
came out here

to be a make-believe guy,
to be an actor.

Yeah.

So it's like
a "only in Hollywood" story.

It's got its fingers
in everything

we know about Hollywood.

You know, we got a porn star
as a suspect...

drugs and money
and Liberace,

Hollywood nightclubs,
and everything

we know of what the '70s
and the '80s were in Hollywood,

this mystery has.

That's what I love
about cold cases.

It's like
a time machine.

What seemed so brutal
when this murder happened

we've seen so much
since then.

The late '80s were a killing
field in Los Angeles.

[siren wailing in distance]

♪♪

[Michael]
Okay, so some years go by,

and this case looks like
it's gone forever, probably.

Yeah. We moved on
to these other cases.

You've got to
prioritize 'em.

You have the Hillside Strangler
with these young girls

who are getting kidnapped,
brutalized,

raped and dumped
over the hills of L.A.,

and then you throw in
the two or three

different Skid Row
serial killings

that we had at the time,
Slasher, Stabber.

30 or 40 derelicts down there
were knifed to death

over a period of
five or six years.

♪♪

[Michael] And it's in the midst
of these other cases

that Lange and Souza's
professional lives

were about to be
turned upside down

when Souza made
a routine check-in

on the Wonderland case.

There was a concerted effort
to smear you guys.

Yeah.

You discovered
this whole thing, right,

when you come into the office
after hours or something?

Yeah. By that time,
the murder book,

we had four volumes
of thick three-ring binders.

That night I went to get
the folders,

the entire case was gone.

All four folders
were missing.

Our captain happened
to be there late.

I said, "Hey, Cap.
I got a problem."

I said, "Our Laurel Canyon case
is missing.

I wonder where it's gone."

He says, uh,
"Sit down a minute, Bob."

And I knew something
was up,

and I said, "No, no,
what's going on?"

He said, "There's been a --

a chief special Internal Affairs
investigation

against you and Tom."

I said, "For what?"

He said, "Well,
there's allegations

that you two were,
uh, were on the take,

and Nash
is paying you guys off.

That's why
you haven't arrested him.

Because
you're on his payroll."

I said, "Jesus." I said,
"I don't believe this shit."

And I mean, I lost it. I said,
"Cap, this is bullshit."

-[chuckles]
-So I stormed out.

I called Tom at home, and I
said, "Tom, you sitting down?"

And I could tell on the other --
I could feel --

I could feel the heat
coming off of Tom.

[Michael]
According to documents

in the internal
investigation file,

an agent with the Bureau of
Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms

was the source of the complaint
against Lange and Souza.

His name was Henry Hoskins.

♪♪

[Tom] Henry Hoskins' office

with the Organized Crime
Strike Force

is right across the street from
Parker Center, where we were.

One afternoon, he came walking
across the street

into our office
and introduced himself.

And he was there
on a fishing expedition.

Yeah. He's kind of an
intimidating type of individual.

He says, "We'd like to know
about your investigation,

what you have, as it
probably ties in with us."

Unbeknownst to us,

he's a federal agent, but he's
also working with Ed Nash.

He's dirty. He's a dirty fed.

We didn't know that
at the time.

He's trying to get what he can
from us.

We gave him nothing.

[Michael] The investigation
into Lange and Souza

never leaked to the public,

but it hung
over the two detectives

and the case
for more than a year.

Here we are,
doing the best we can

to solve a quadruple murder,
and we're being followed.

Find out
we're being surveilled.

Um, they're checking
everything we did.

Every entry in our log
is being analyzed.

Now who do we trust?
We have no idea.

Hoskins was probably dialed in
all the way up to the mayor.

♪♪

During that time,
with just two and a half years

of a seven-year sentence
served,

Nash claims
to have developed a sinus tumor

and petitioned to be released
to get medical treatment.

♪♪

And the judge
cut the sentence...

made him eligible
for immediate parole.

I was astounded!

Is this the same judge
that maxed him out?

What happened?!

You know, I was amazed.

He gets out of prison...
and never had surgery.

He was released
because of a tumor.

Did you know that
to be a true story?

No. [chuckles]

He never had
an operation afterwards.

No, but he had
lung problems.

I do know that.
From smoking that crack.

[Michael] Was there anything
you could do about that?

It's over. It's done.

Judge Rix sentenced Nash
to eight years in prison.

He didn't serve but two years,
and Rix let him out.

It just --
It was just unbelievable.

[siren wailing in distance]

[Michael]
With Nash out of prison,

it was back to business
as usual.

[reporter] The Odyssey is
a popular teenage nightclub.

Teens can dance here until
4:00 in the morning on weekdays

and 5:00 a.m. on weekends.

No liquor is served,
but the kids are out very late,

and they're causing problems.

The Odyssey eventually
became an under-21 club

because the liquor license
was lost.

Eddie Nash made it
into a club

where young,
young people could come.

13-, 14-year-olds.

Drugs were everywhere.

The main purpose
for the clubs was

that's where he sold
the crack and the cocaine,

especially at The Odyssey.

He had -- In the office
were pounds of cocaine

that he would sell
to the kids that came in.

[1980s synthesizer music
playing]

[reporter] About 50 teenagers
demonstrated in front

of The Odyssey nightclub
near West Hollywood today.

The Odyssey's dance permit
was revoked earlier this week

by the police commission

following neighbors' complaints
about the kids.

The spokesman for the club
says the owner plans

to appeal the decision that
revoked the club's dance permit.

We've been here nine years.

We've never had an arrest
on a location in nine years

or any violations.

[Scott] Chris Cox was
a big supplier for Nash.

I thought he always owned
The Odyssey,

but I understand that
it was Nash that owned it.

[Michael] Facing continued
pressure from the neighbors

and the police commission
and losing money,

The Odyssey
closed its doors.

[door closes]

[reporter] The buildings were
mostly empty

and were scheduled to be
auctioned off the end of April.

[siren wailing,
fire crackling]

Arson investigators
are looking into a fire

that broke out late today

at the controversial
Odyssey nightclub.

Witnesses in the area saw
people throw some type of liquid

into the front of the building
and ignite the fire

at the front portion
of the building.

[Michael]
Neither Eddie Nash,

nor anyone else,
for that matter,

was ever charged
in the arson of The Odyssey.

But when there's smoke,
there's fire.

♪♪

In federal custody,
they have Henry Hoskins snitch.

He's one of the guys

who was setting
the arson fires for Nash.

"You see Nash,
the puppet master here?"

Okay, so back to
the investigation into you guys.

It's easy to say,
"Who's behind this?

Nash is behind this."

But how did you --
how did you prove that?

What happened to Hoskins
that revealed the puppet master?

Hoskins left the feds
during this investigation.

They knew he was dirty.
He left.

He opens the private
investigator business

on Sunset Boulevard.

He uses Ed Nash's nightclub,
the Seven Seas, as his address.

♪♪

[chuckles]

And his office is upstairs
from Nash's business.

♪♪

Now we know that
he's connected to Ed Nash.

♪♪

With Nash,

imagine being that type of guy
that was so comfortable

trying to get investigators
off of a case.

That means it's worked for you
several times before, right?

This isn't just like,
"I'm gonna try my luck at this."

That is a, um,
a different kind of villain.

♪♪

[Michael]
So at the end of the day,

with the investigation
into you guys,

they promulgate a...would you
say four-inch-thick report?

And it ends
with one line saying...

"Detectives Lange and Souza --

we could find no improprieties

in the above referenced case."

That was it.
"No improprieties."

No apologies.
That pissed us off.

♪♪

[wind howls]

♪♪

[Michael]
Though back in business,

Eddie Nash needed to take
precautions.

[Scott] He used to give me
pounds of cocaine

to take my condo in Studio City
because he was in fear.

He trusted me that I would
not steal from him.

And then he'd call me and says,
"Okay, I'm home. Bring it up."

And that's what I would do.

While playing a role
in the crack epidemic,

Scott finds himself reuniting
with his former lover

as the result
of another epidemic

that's sweeping the nation.

[Scott] For a long time,
we didn't speak,

and I didn't see him
other than in court

or in depositions.

And, uh, a reporter called me
from Las Vegas

and said
that he's terribly ill,

and there's a rumor
that he's dying of AIDS.

♪♪

[announcer] Liberace!

[cheers and applause]

♪♪

I flew
to Radio City Music Hall,

where he was performing

with the Radio City
Music Hall Rockettes.

♪♪

["Clair de Lune" playing]

It was one of
his last shows...

and, uh, backstage there were
paramedics and oxygen tanks.

He asked me a question.

He says, "Are you okay?
You're healthy?"

I said, "Yeah, why?"

♪♪

He says,
"I was just checking."

♪♪

So I went there, to his home.
Palm Springs, California.

♪♪

I gave him a hug,
and when I gave him a hug,

I could feel the bones.

He was just a skeleton
of what he was.

♪♪

He went fast, so I proceeded
to take care of him.

We fed him his last meal.

♪♪

He died in my arms.

♪♪

["Clair de Lune" ends,
applause]

[applause fades]

[Michael] You wrote a book
called Behind the Candelabra.

Yes.

When did you
start writing that?

Was Liberace still alive?
Was he--

No, he was dead.

I started writing that
right after his death.

I decided to tell, you know,
an all-tell book.

People needed to know
the truth,

what happened to me.
I was very young.

He was 40 years my senior.
He knew what he was doing.

He should be
ashamed of himself.

I was just a kid.
I didn't know anything.

[Michael]
In Thorson's book,

neither the Wonderland murders
or Nash are mentioned,

but there's a reference
to a mysterious drug dealer

known only as Mr. Y.

And Liberace
would not be the only one

connected
to the Wonderland case

to fall victim
to the AIDS epidemic.

[reporter] People in
the porn industry have told us

it was hard for John to get
work after the trial,

so he turned to the gay market.

Riddled with the disease,
addicted to cocaine,

he continued
to make porn films,

knowingly spreading
the disease.

♪♪

He still was performing

when he, uh, had AIDS,
and he wasn't telling...

-Yeah.
-...other people about it.

He was, uh, introducing
AIDS to the group.

[Michael] By this time,
Detective Bob Souza had retired,

and Tom Lange's new partner
was Mac McClain,

the same detective
who guarded John Holmes

at the Biltmore Hotel
back in '81.

[Michael] What were
you doing before Tom said,

"Will you be my partner?"

In 1986, there was a serial
killer

The "Southside Slayer,"
we called him.

Was killing prostitutes.

And so I came there
as a part of that.

After the Southside Slayer case
ended, Tom says,

"Hey,
I don't have a partner.

I'll see
if they'll let you stay."

I think he did that
because both of us

had been in the Marines
in Vietnam at the same time.

[Tom] I was working
with Mac McClain,

and we got information

that John was
at the Veterans Hospital

in the San Fernando Valley.

At the time, we were
just trying to find Holmes.

We go out
to the VA hospital,

see if John Holmes
is checked in there.

And, yes, he is.

He apparently had
contacted AIDS,

and he wasn't in good shape.

This told me and Mac
that maybe he's ready to talk.

-I mean, we got nothing to lose.
-Yeah.

So Mac and I went in.
He was in bed.

He looked terrible.

He weighed about 90 pounds.
He looked really, really frail.

His hair was really long.
He had really long fingernails.

He was obviously
in some kind of agony.

♪♪

I says, "John, by your own
admission, you're dying."

And I goes, "You wanna
take this with you?"

I goes, "You want to
let Nash go free?"

"Once you're gone,"
I goes, "they're not gonna do

anything to your family."

And all of a sudden,
he pops up...

-[clattering]
-[John] I heard some noises

coming from the direction
of the bedroom.

I decided to investigate.

And he says, "When I was doing
my Johnny Wadd detective series,

I tried to emulate
what you guys do."

JOHN: So, we meet again.

Look, I was just looking for
some love letters I wrote.

You were looking
for love letters. Like hell.

I think you were
looking for something else.

He was all,
"I pretended to be a detective,

and I really like LAPD."

All this crap, you know,
feeding us this nonsense.

You son of a bitch.

♪♪

He said,
"I'll tell you what I'll do.

I'm gonna write it all down
for you. Lay it all out."

I looked at Mac,
and he looked at me,

and we weren't going to go
anywhere with this.

It's the same old John Holmes

talking out of both sides
of his mouth. Nothing changes.

We're not gonna get
anything from him.

If he writes something down,
fine.

Of course, he never did.

The undisputed king
of porn films in the 1970s,

the man who claimed to
have had sex with 14,000 women,

died yesterday
at a veterans hospital

in Southern California.

He was 43 years old.

[Tom] He died from the AIDS

about 12 days
after we'd been there.

We'll never know what he knew.
It's history.

♪♪

[Michael] John Holmes took
his secret to the grave.

But shortly after his death,

his former wife Sharon
agreed to be interviewed

on Current Affair,
disguised only by a wig.

He certainly was capable
of knowingly having

the disease longer

than anyone else knew
and spreading it.

I mean, would that be
so hard to understand

when you can stand there

and watch four people
be butchered in front of you?

♪♪

[Michael]
Not only did she confirm

Holmes' involvement
in the murders,

she went on to confirm
the bizarre bathtub story

she told detective Tom Lange
seven years earlier.

We started with the shaking
and the crying, and he says,

"I do have to tell you 'cause I
can't live with this by myself."

If there was something
he knew, you wouldn't like.

This was always done
in the bathroom,

and it was always done
in the bathtub.

This scene was depicted in
the Hollywood film Wonderland,

starring Val Kilmer
and Lisa Kudrow.

-Oh, just a cut.
-There's too much blood.

-I gotta get it off. Okay?
-John, where's the wound?

There's no wound.

This isn't your blood,
John.

Whose blood is this?

It's kind of like
Macbeth's wife

washing her hands
sort of thing.

He sold his soul that night.

Everything else was gone.

But to stand there
and watch a butchering

or a slaughtering like that
and doing nothing?

I said,
"John, how could you?"

And he said,
"They were dirt."

♪♪

And I said, "John,
you knew these people."

And he said, "They were dirt,
and they were stupid."

♪♪

The Wonderland case
simmered for years

after Holmes' acquittal
in 1982.

We, the jury,
find the Defendant,

John Curtis Holmes,

not guilty of murder.

[reporter] John Holmes was
acquitted of first degree.

I do not feel that
justice was served.

[reporter #2]
Case remains unsolved,

and we may never know
what really happened.

[Michael] But a big break
came thanks to the work

of Detective Rick Jackson.

[Michael] You were
the first suit at the scene

of the Wonderland massacre.

It kind of came full circle
when you ended up

bringing a key person
to that investigation.

But why don't we start
by how you met this person

and what that case was about?

Yeah. So I'm -- I'm a detective
assigned to Hollywood homicide.

It's September of '87.

[siren wailing]

My partner and I
got called out

to a murder that happened
on Cherokee Avenue.

Some suspects went in
with guns to an apartment,

and it was
a drug rip-off,

and there were some
sexual assaults that took place.

Eventually, arrests were made
of a couple of suspects...

...and one of them
had a connection

to the Black Guerilla Family,

and the name Scott Thorson
comes up.

♪♪

[Michael]
What was that all about?

There was a young lady
that used to run

these abandoned
apartment buildings with us.

I happened to show up that day
at one of the crack houses.

-Who are you with?
-A member of the Bloods.

They told me
to knock on the door

and tell her to let them in.

I knocked on the door,
and they pushed me aside.

And when she opened it,
they barged in.

That's all I had.
I didn't do any robbing.

I didn't do anything.

But didn't you know
what they were gonna do?

No, he didn't tell me.

And you didn't go in?
You left?

No, but I know
that they raped her.

And so that's when
a warrant was put out

for my arrest for robbery.

And that's when
Rick Jackson came into play.

Actually,
he probably saved my life.

[flash bulb crackles]

You get arrested
by Rick Jackson?

Yes.

[Rick]: So I get
the warrant for Scott Thorson.

I learned
who Scott Thorson was.

You know, I knew that,

you know, he was
connected to Liberace.

So in February of 1988,

I went to the county jail

and interviewed Scott Thorson
for the first time.

And we connected to the extent
of he was trying to help me,

but he's also obviously looking
out for his own interests

'cause he potentially
was gonna go to state prison

for this robbery.

So you're in county jail.

County jail.
Eddie Nash pulled my bail.

He put me there,
and he kept me there.

It was time to get rid of me
'cause he was through with me.

I was very angry.
He was betraying me.

I was very loyal
to Eddie Nash.

I never went to police.

I says, "Okay." I says,
"You're gonna join me soon."

I says, "If I'm in jail,
you're gonna go too."

[cell door clanking]

[Michael] It's like almost
10 years after the crime.

You have
what appears to be

or may be new life to --
to the investigation.

Initially, Scott Thorson
got into the wind.

We didn't hear from him
for years.

Later, of course
he needed something,

so I got a call
from the county jail.

He wants to talk to us
'cause he's got

information on the murders.

[Michael] Years after the
murders on Wonderland Avenue,

Lange would finally meet
the man who knew too much.

Mac and I went over there,
and Scott looked terrible,

and he'd been rung up
on another charge locally.

He wanted a little help
with that, obviously,

and he would
have something to say.

So Rick Jackson inadvertently
got the Wonderland case

basically out of mothballs.
-Mm-hmm.

What Rick had done was
arrest Thorson for a robbery.

But Thorson, facing jail time,
said, "I will cooperate.

I was at Eddie Nash's house
the night of those murders,"

and that kickstarted
the whole thing again.

[video rewinds]

It did.

We were a little impatient
initially,

but he got down to it.

To make a long story short,
Mr. Nash one night

was throwing
a big, well-to-do party.

♪♪

And he was robbed of over
a million dollars' worth

of drugs, money, and jewelry.

[breathing heavily]

And later that day I was in the
wrong place at the wrong time.

Scott tells us he was
actually in the house

when John Holmes was brought
into the house by Greg Diles.

[Scott]
Mr. Nash found the man

that was responsible
for setting the robberies up,

brought him back to his house,
almost beat him to death.

[hits thudding, man groaning]

And then he ordered
the young man to take him

up to Laurel Canyon
to where these people lived.

And he ordered his bodyguard
to have these people killed.

[hits thudding]

Four people died.

They had holes about the size
of a baseball in their heads.

Greg Diles hit one
of the victims so hard

that it left an indentation
from the pipe in the forehead.

They didn't go public
with that.

How'd you know about it?

I heard Gregory Diles
tell Nash

that he hit the victim
so hard

that the pipe threads left
an indentation.

There were five victims
involved.

One victim survived.

By the grace of God,
she survived.

They cut her finger off.

It launched
one of the biggest

and the most massive crime
investigations in Los Angeles.

[Michael]
Based on this new information

coming from Scott Thorson,

you go back to the DA,
and you build a case,

a new case against Nash
and Greg Diles.

-They're charged with murder.
-Right.

[man] Deputy District Attorney
Carol Najera. Marker.

Somewhat out of the blue

comes this guy
named Scott Thorson

that kind of resuscitates
the case.

Can you talk about
that history, how it --

it was the case
it wouldn't go away,

and then it suddenly
came back?

When Scott Thorson
came forward,

Tom Lange and Mac McClain
vetted him a lot.

By the time they were convinced
that he actually had something

that was actual,
credible evidence

that could be used
in this case,

they both came to me
and asked

if I would like to join
the organized crime unit

and do the Wonderland case.

And I thought it was
an amazing opportunity,

so of course
I jumped on it.

So what was the first thing
you had to do--

take a deep dive into
who Eddie Nash was?

Exactly.
I read a lot of articles.

I read a lot
of police reports on him,

and then I read the transcripts
from the John Holmes trial

that Judge Cohen had done,

as well as
the drug trafficking case

that he had successfully
prosecuted Eddie Nash on.

[Michael]
With the DA on board,

the detectives then proceeded
to arrest Nash and Diles.

[siren wailing]

You and Tom split up
to make these arrests.

Yes, 'cause we figure
if Nash gets in jail

and warns Diles,
Diles is gone.

They arrest Nash.
We're going to Diles.

We go to the Seven Seas,

where he works
as a parking lot attendant.

We arrest him.
We get in the car.

I'm sitting next to him,
and he looks over and he goes,

"What am I being
arrested for?"

I go, "Murder."
He goes, "Hmm."

That's all he said.

[jet engines roaring]

I'm flying to Las Vegas,
short flight,

and I'm, you know,
reading the LA Times.

And all of a sudden
I see an article.

I knew
it was about Wonderland,

and I started reading it.

♪♪

And kind of like,
"Holy shit."

The article confirmed
that Scott Thorson,

who was in custody
for a robbery --

my robbery --

um, had come forward by
meeting with the DA's office

and the detectives
on the Wonderland murders.

♪♪

[Michael] So for his involvement
as the key witness,

what happened with
Thorson's robbery charges?

They weren't dismissed.

He was allowed to plead guilty
to a felony robbery,

but he served no time
other than the time

that he had served up
to the point.

♪♪

The murder charges
against Nash and Diles

were going to hinge
on Scott's testimony.

But your key witness now
is not that much better

than -- than Holmes, right?

I mean, this is a guy
who has a criminal record.

He also
has drug problems.

How do you
go about making him

that -- that strong witness
in court?

♪♪

[Tom] Well, making him
a strong witness,

it's not real easy to do.

Our problem was that,
much like John Holmes,

he does, in fact, talk out of
both sides of his mouth.

Oh, yeah.

Scott, um, he'll forever be
able to tell stories

which sometimes seem kind of
over the top and bizarre,

but a lot of them,
I've learned, have been true.

When he starts telling
the story,

he gets very animated

telling what happened
that night.

But a problem you have
when you have somebody

in jail as a witness,

the first thing the Defense
is going to say,

"You got
a jailhouse snitch."

And so
you have to weigh that.

Do we believe him enough,

or is he just trying
to use us

to get out of jail?

[Michael] Okay, so I --
I write books. I write novels,

and a device I use is something
called the unreliable narrator.

Do you know
what that means?

-Not really. [chuckles]
-Okay.

So it's where you take a very
important person in a story,

and you don't know whether
they're telling the truth,

and you have to try
to figure that out.

And that's a little bit of
what we're doing now with you.

Well, I think --
I think some

of these unbelievable stories
that you mentioned,

you're a good author.
You're a good investigator.

I don't think you found
anything that was untrue.

I'm telling the truth.
I've lived the life.

That's all I can say.

Believe me,
or you don't believe me.

I'm telling the truth.
I have no reason to lie.

Your client murdered
those people,

had those people
murdered.

I heard it, I saw it.

I saw Mr. Diles
and Mr. Holmes.

And there isn't anything you can
do and say that I'm lying now.

That man is a murderer
right there.

♪♪

♪♪