Police Say Alias Hid Man From ’81 Murder Charge

A Chatsworth businessman was arrested on his way to work Friday after being identified as a suspect sought for seven years in a New York murder, Los Angeles police said.

Police said the suspect, Ronald Schwartz, 35, also is awaiting trial in Los Angeles for an attempted murder charge filed against Ronald J. Moore, the alias Schwartz used in the San Fernando Valley.

Fugitive squad detectives arrested Schwartz at 8:30 a.m. as he drove away from his home in the 22100 block of Itasca Street in Chatsworth.

Schwartz is being held without bail at the downtown City Jail.

“He is . . . denying who he is,” Detective Tom Gorey said. “But we know it’s him. When we stopped him and said, ‘Schwartz, it’s over,’ you could see it made an impression on him. But he won’t say a word about it.”

Gorey said police determined that Ronald J. Moore and Ronald Schwartz are the same man by comparing fingerprints. Schwartz, the suspected triggerman in a March 4, 1981, robbery and killing in the Bronx, has been sought by the New York City Police Department since the shooting, Gorey said. An accomplice in the killing was convicted and is in a New York prison, he said.

Gorey said New York police told Los Angeles police of Schwartz’s whereabouts after receiving a tip. Gorey said it is unknown how long the suspect lived in the Valley under the name of Moore. He operated an employment business, RJM Co. in Canoga Park, which recently went bankrupt, Gorey said.

Schwartz, while using the Moore alias, was charged with attempted murder after his arrest in the November shooting of his girlfriend in Chatsworth, police said.

Gorey said Friday he did not know why fingerprints taken at the time of the arrest here did not identify Moore as Schwartz. He was released on bail and was awaiting trial when arrested Friday, he said.

Fingerprints of criminal suspects are usually fed into a national crime computer that can match them with others on file. Gorey said it was unknown whether that routine was followed with Moore’s prints, though New York police had put Schwartz’s prints in the national computer file.