Ng Says Cohort Killed 6 People : Blames Lake in 5-Hour Interview by S.F. Police

Charles C. Ng, linked by police to the death or disappearance of 22 people in Northern California, has made a statement to authorities in Canada that blames his partner, Leonard T. Lake, for the murder of at least six of those people, police said Monday.

Lt. George Kowalski, chief of the San Francisco Police Deparment homicide squad, said Ng’s remarks were made Sunday during a five-hour interrogation by two San Francisco police investigators in Calgary, where Ng is in custody after his capture over the weekend.

“He’s blaming Lake, Leonard Lake, for what went on in Wilseyville,” Kowalski said, referring to the remote Calaveras County town where Lake lived and where nine bodies and 40 pounds of human bones have been unearthed. Lake was arrested by South San Francisco police June 2 and committed suicide, apparently by taking poison, while in custody.

“This is nothing we didn’t expect. He’s blaming the other guy, the dead guy,” Kowalski said.

He said Ng named Lake as the killer of Paul Cosner; Harvey and Deborah Dubs and their 1 1/2-year-old son, Sean; Jeff Gerald and Cliff Peranteau. All were from San Francisco.

Kowalski declined to release further details of Ng’s conversation with San Francisco police investigators Ed Erdelatz and Jeff Brosch until the two men return from Canada today or Wednesday.

The six people mentioned by Kowalski are among those listed as missing and linked to Ng and Lake. Of the bodies unearthed so far at Wilseyville, only one has been identified: that of Randy Jacobsen, 35, of San Francisco.

Cosner, 40, a San Francisco car broker, was last seen in November, when he went to show his Honda to a potential buyer he described as “that weird guy.” When Lake was arrested June 2, he was driving Cosner’s car.

The Dubs family was last seen in July, 1984. The San Francisco family was trying to rent its video gear, which later was found at Lake’s Wilseyville home.

Former Co-Worker

Gerald, 25, was a struggling musician who worked days at the same moving company as Ng. He disappeared in February after telling friends he was going to Central California to help Ng move. Peranteau, 24, also worked at the same moving company as Ng. He vanished in January.

Ng met Lake in 1981 when he was on the run from a charge that he stole arms from a Marine Corps armory in Hawaii. Ng lived for about six months with Lake and Lake’s former wife in Mendocino County. He was with Lake when Lake was arrested June 2 but managed to escape.

In Calgary, Ng’s Canadian defense attorney, Brian Devlin, said he is concerned because Ng was questioned by police for so long without legal counsel. He said that Ng had asked for a lawyer but that one was not allowed to see him until the conclusion of the interview with lawmen from Calgary, San Francisco and Calaveras County.

San Francisco public defenders expressed some doubt about whether Ng’s statement would be admissible in a California court because no lawyer was present.

Despite Ng’s statement, the chances that he will be quickly returned to California appeared to dim Monday when a court-appointed psychiatrist declared him competent to stand trial on Canadian charges. Authorities in Calgary expressed an eagerness to prosecute Ng on an attempted murder charge before considering extradition to California. Attempted murder carries a life imprisonment sentence in Alberta.

“We intend to proceed full steam with the local charges . . . as we would with any other case,” said Ron Tarrant of the Calgary Police Department.

Time for Details

In Sacramento, Deputy Atty. Gen. Robert Jibson said the delay may not be entirely disappointing because Canadian extraditions require very detailed witness affidavits and lists of charges that cannot be upgraded once a suspect has been returned.

The prosecution of the Canadian charges, therefore, “would certainly give more time” to California officials trying to piece together a criminal case against Ng, Jibson said.

The case is so perplexing because Ng’s alleged partner, Lake, is dead and because the remains found at Wilseyville are practically unidentifiable after having been crudely dismembered and then burned before either being dumped in shallow graves or sprinkled throughout the woods.

Ng, arrested in Calgary on Saturday while trying to shoot his way past department store security guards who caught him in an apparent shoplifting attempt, appeared twice Monday before Judge Hubert Oliver in the Provincial Court of Alberta.

In the morning, Ng was remanded for the psychiatric evaluation; about 4 1/2 hours later, Devlin was back in court to argue successfully for a one-week postponement of further court hearings.

Wrists, Ankles Shackled

Ng was formally read the Canadian charges against him Monday: one count each of attempted murder, unlawful use of a firearm and robbery.

Ng appeared dazed in court. His hair was tousled and he wore regular jail-issue dark-green clothes. His hands were scratched and he complained of a numbness in one arm. In his cell, his wrists and ankles are shackled to his waist and he is kept on 24-hour suicide watch.

Legal experts in California contacted by The Times agree that the Canadians almost certainly will prosecute their case against Ng before they begin to consider extraditing him to the United States.

“If they returned him here (first), they would have to turn around and go through the whole extradition process again to get him back,” said Jerrold Ladar, a San Francisco lawyer familiar with international extradition treaties.

In any case, the lawyers agreed, attempted murder is a more serious charge than kidnaping, the most serious charge now facing Ng in California. Ng also is accused in California warrants of false imprisonment, burglary and unlawful flight.

Despite their harmony on that point, the legal experts disagreed whether the Canadians will return Ng to face the death penalty if California decides to charge him with murder.

Canada does not exercise capital punishment, and its extradition pact with the United States contains an article that apparently forbids extraditing someone when the maximum penalty for the crime he or she is accused of is death.

Common Treaty Article

“They simply wouldn’t return someone to face a penalty that they don’t use themselves,” said Ladar. He said such treaty conditions are “not unusual where the other country does not have capital punishment.”

Jibson said, however, that Canada may not actually be prohibited by the treaty from returning prisoners in death penalty cases.

“Our view is that the article (in the extradition treaty) is discretionary and not an absolute bar,” he said. “They could do that (refuse to return him unless the death penalty was ruled out), but we believe it’s not a requirement that they do so.”

Sean Doyle, the unarmed 46-year-old security guard who captured Ng, said he tried to question Ng after watching him stuff a can of salmon, soft drinks and other food into a bag.

‘He’s Got a Gun!’

He said Ng resisted, then asked to get his wallet out of a knapsack he was carrying. Doyle said a fellow security guard, George Forrester, yelled, “He’s got a gun!” and Doyle instinctively grabbed for it.

During a brief tussle, one round was discharged into the floor, Doyle said, “then he tried to turn the gun on me and I pushed it toward the ground.” A second shot smashed through the middle finger of Doyle’s left hand before the two guards wrestled Ng to the floor with the gun pinned safely beneath him.

“He was bent on trying to kill us--me particularly,” said Doyle, his left arm in a bandage.

Mark A. Stein reported from San Francisco and Louis Sahagun from Calgary.