Grand Jury to Investigate Slaying That Spurred Suit

A Los Angeles County grand jury will hold hearings on the 7-month-old murder of a Van Nuys woman whose mother later filed a $10-million lawsuit claiming three sheriff’s deputies killed her daughter, according to court papers filed by police.

Catherine M. Braley, 26, was found slain in a parking lot in the 8100 block of Sepulveda Boulevard on the morning of Jan. 15. She had been beaten, strangled and mutilated. Los Angeles police have not made an arrest in the case and have repeatedly denied that deputies are suspects.

Three months after the murder, Braley’s mother, Mary Postma, filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court that accused three deputies of killing her daughter when she refused to have sex with them after a night of drinking. The three deputies denied the allegations.

Postma later agreed to drop two deputies from the suit, but the third, Robert Mallon, who acknowledged having consensual sex with Braley the night before her body was discovered, remains a defendant. Mallon has said he did not kill Braley, and Los Angeles police have repeatedly denied any of the deputies are suspects in the slaying.

Mother Subpoenaed

Postma’s attorney, Stephen Yagman, said Friday that Postma was subpoenaed to appear before the grand jury on Thursday. Authorities confirmed she was subpoenaed, but would not say whether other subpoenas were distributed in the case.

Carol Ann Hummer, an attorney representing the three deputies, said that none of them were subpoenaed by the grand jury and they are not involved in this latest turn in the investigation.

It is unclear why the grand jury is being used in the probe. Police and the district attorney’s office also declined comment, but documents filed in the Postma lawsuit indicate police are moving toward an arrest in the case.

The documents, containing declarations of two detectives involved in the Braley investigation, were filed in the case by police to block Postma’s request for access to police records and evidence.

Arrest Expected

“The district attorney has agreed, at my request, to conduct grand jury hearings of several witnesses concerning the death of Ms. Braley,” says the declaration of Lt. L.A. Durrer, detective commander at the Van Nuys station.

“Following the grand jury hearings, it is anticipated that the perpetrator will be arrested and criminally charged with murder,” Durrer wrote.

Authorities said the use of a grand jury to conduct hearings for an ongoing criminal investigation is not common because the district attorney’s office does not need the grand jury’s approval to charge a murder suspect. However, the grand jury is often used as a tool to get uncooperative witnesses to reveal information. By granting immunity to a witness, a grand jury can compel that witness to give testimony.

Authorities would not comment on whether that was the strategy in subpoenaing Postma, but papers filed in the lawsuit indicate that Postma has declined to cooperate with police investigators. In his declaration, Detective Mel Arnold said that Yagman had refused to allow investigators to interview Postma unless she was brought before a grand jury.

Harassment Charged

On Friday, Yagman said Postma initially cooperated with police in the investigation but later stopped because she thinks police are harassing her because of the lawsuit against the deputies.

“Mrs. Postma feels the LAPD has been harassing her,” Yagman said. “I can’t imagine what legitimate reason there is for getting information from Mary Postma. She has no information on how the crime was committed. Therefore, why would they want to talk to her? I think the LAPD is just trying to harass her when she is a victim in this.”

Yagman charged that the grand jury hearings may simply be intended to thwart his efforts to prepare Postma’s civil case against Mallon, the remaining deputy named in the case.

“They are trying to use this grand jury thing to prevent me from getting the evidence,” he said.