The Region - News from June 3, 1987

A Los Angeles police officer believed to have masterminded a yacht-stealing ring pleaded innocent to charges that he arranged the contract murder of an insurance investigator’s wife. The investigator, Arthur Gayle Smith, accused of having Officer William Leasure arrange the murder, also pleaded innocent to murder and murder conspiracy charges in the May 29, 1980, fatal shooting of Ann Smith, 41. Municipal Court Judge Glenette Blackwell ordered Leasure, 40, and Smith, 55, to return for a preliminary hearing June 10. Leasure also faces charges, with Paulette de los Reyes, 44, of murder and conspiracy to commit murder in connection with the Sept. 10, 1981, slaying of de los Reyes’ husband, Antonio, 63. The woman pleaded innocent last week to hiring Leasure to arrange her husband’s murder and will also appear June 10.