Garden Grove : Transient Shot, Killed; Wife Held in Murder

A transient was found dead in a parked camper of a gunshot wound to the chest Sunday night, and his wife, sitting in a nearby car with a loaded gun, was arrested on a murder charge, Garden Grove police said Monday.

Sgt. Bruce Beauchamp said police received a call about 11:45 p.m. that a man was passed out or drunk in a camper behind a restaurant at Knott Street and Stanford Avenue. However, responding officers found only a car with a woman and a loaded .38-caliber revolver on the seat beside her, he said.

Maureen Rutinshauser, 44, listed as a transient, was arrested on a charge of possession of a loaded weapon in a vehicle while officers continued to search the area for the camper, Beauchamp said.

Officers found the camper on the other side of a fence a short distance away, in the 1270 block of Brady Way, Beauchamp said. The back door was open and the victim, Walter E. Rutinshauser, 48, was lying on the floor of the camper, he said. Maureen Rutinshauser was then also arrested on a murder charge and booked into Orange County Jail, he said.

Both the car and camper were registered to an address in Cypress, but apparently neither Rutinshauser was living there, Beauchamp said. Although the police log stated the two were married, Beauchamp said it was possible that the couple were estranged or divorced.