Police to Seek Murder Charge Against Rapist in 1985 Slaying Case

A murder charge will be sought against an imprisoned rapist in the slaying almost two years ago of a woman whose skeletal remains were found last week in the Santa Monica Mountains in Studio City, Los Angeles police said Tuesday.

The woman, Lisa Ann Mather, 18, of West Los Angeles, was last seen on Jan. 12, 1985, outside the Whiskey A Go Go bar in West Hollywood with a man now believed to be Edmund Arne Matthews, Detective Howard Landgren said. Her mother reported her missing three days later.

Matthews, 29, of North Hollywood is serving a 10-year sentence on convictions for two 1984 rapes, Landgren said. Police will present evidence next week to the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office, and ask for a murder charge against Matthews, who is imprisoned at the California Mens Colony at San Luis Obispo, he said.

Found in Remote Area

A transient found Mather’s remains Dec. 3 in a remote wooded area north of Mulholland Drive and west of Coldwater Canyon Boulevard, police said.

The two 1984 rapes occurred near that area, and Matthews met those victims at a bar near where Mather was last seen, Landgren said. Matthews was not arrested for those crimes until late in January, 1985, after Mather disappeared, he said.

An autopsy did not determine the cause of Mather’s death, Landgren said.

Detectives found bits of clothing and other physical evidence near where Mather’s remains were found, Landgren said, but he declined to elaborate.