Prosecutors try to put limits on Spector defense

Phil Spector’s lawyers should be barred from calling witnesses to “assassinate” the character of Lana Clarkson, the woman he allegedly shot to death, according to court papers filed Friday.

Prosecutors argued that defense witnesses will allege that Clarkson was suicidal and used narcotics, and will try to paint Clarkson’s prescriptions for headaches as medication for depression.

Prosecutors revealed Friday that after her death, investigators found on Clarkson’s home computer what appears to be an incomplete memoir, which states she “used drugs when she was younger.”

Spector, a 67-year-old music producer, is charged with killing Clarkson, 40, in 2003 at his hilltop home in Alhambra.

He has pleaded not guilty, and his defense has alleged that she committed suicide, and her mental state could be an issue in the trial.

The defense, according to prosecutor Alan Jackson, will try to show that Clarkson was depressed because she took the drugs Elavil, Fiorinal and Paxil for depression. But Jackson said medical records show that the prescriptions were for headaches and ran out as much as a year before she was killed.

“It is irrelevant. It is intended as bad-character evidence, and it threatens undue prejudice, confusion of the issues and could mislead the jury,” Jackson argued in papers filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court.

Jackson contends that the memoir probably was written two years before Clarkson died and referred to drug use 14 or more years before her death.

It is not unusual for unexpected information to be revealed shortly before trial, when prosecutors and defense attorneys must share their evidence. Pretrial motions continue in the case next week.

Jackson asked for restrictions on potential testimony by three other witnesses and argued that portions of a film Clarkson made in which she allegedly handled a handgun are not relevant to the trial and should be excluded from evidence.

He did not identify the film but said Clarkson’s role was minor and inoffensive compared with other material it contained.

One of the witnesses was identified as “Punkie Pie” Laughlin, a former friend who is prepared to testify for the defense that Clarkson used the painkiller Vicodin “recreationally,” said she was suicidal, was depressed over her failing acting career and felt humiliated by her job as a hostess at the House of Blues on Sunset Boulevard. That was where she met Spector hours before she died.

But Jackson said Laughlin gave investigators a different account the day Clarkson died, saying she was never suicidal. The prosecutor said in the court filing that Laughlin plans to write a book and has consulted “a Spector associate on how to handle public relations.”

Another former friend, Jennifer Hayes, is prepared to testify for the defense that Clarkson was a selfish, belligerent, heavy-drinking “amazon” who lived a life of “one-night stands.”

The third witness, identified as John Barons, a playwright, said Clarkson told him three years ago that she took drugs for pain and told him, “If I don’t make it by 40, I will jump off a bridge.”

Earlier Friday, prosecutors complained that their attempts to fully interview 12 experts who may be called by the defense had been unsuccessful. Among them was a doctor who has said Clarkson’s medications were for the treatment of depression.

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john.spano@latimes.com