Judy Kanan Case : Police Want to Question Man in Killing

Detectives on Wednesday released a sketch of a man wanted for questioning about the slaying of Judy Kanan, an Agoura Hills businesswoman who was shot Jan. 29 at a Woodland Hills horse corral.

A police artist made the drawing of a man who had an argument with Miss Kanan at the restaurant she operated in an Agoura Hills shopping center owned by the Kanan family, Detective Phil Quartararo of the Los Angeles Police Department said.

The artist was guided by a witness who had given the man directions to the restaurant, the detective said.

The man was described as white, 30 to 35 years old, 5 feet, 8 inches tall, about 150 pounds and having a full beard. He was seen driving a white, late-model Mercedes-Benz.

Different Description

The description does not match the height and weight of the killer seen by witnesses, Quartararo said. He said the killer was described as a bigger person.

The man in the sketch is not regarded as a suspect, Quartararo said, “but we want to talk to him and perhaps eliminate him as a suspect.”

Miss Kanan, 60, who lived in Hollywood, was shot four times by a person who was waiting for her when she drove up to a corral in the 22900 block of Collins Street to feed horses she kept there.

The killer wore a ski mask and a yellow rain coat, witnesses said. The killer fled in a car that had been stolen from a Pontiac dealer’s lot in Woodland Hills, police said. The car was set afire and abandoned minutes after the shooting and less than a mile away.

Miss Kanan was a descendant of the Waring family, which settled in Agoura in the 1860s. She was a daughter of land developer Richard Kanan, who owned several thousand acres in the area.

Kanan Road, connecting the Ventura Freeway to Pacific Coast Highway, is named after the family.

Operated Restaurant

She carried on many of her father’s business interests after his death, including Kanan Village Shopping Center, where she operated The Honey Bunny, a restaurant specializing in roast rabbit.

The man in the police sketch approached her there, saying he wanted to open a stereo equipment shop in the center, Quartararo said. The man argued with Miss Kanan over the rent she wanted until she refused to rent to him at any price, the detective said.

After the argument, Miss Kanan began receiving threatening telephone calls from an unknown woman, Quartararo said.