Elderly Millionairess OK After Ordeal That Led to Kidnap, Extortion Arrests

Millionairess Jean Fay Drexler smiles a little, cries a little and talks a lot since she was found walking near her expensive Hollywood Hills home by neighbors who took her in and called authorities, her court-appointed attorney said Thursday.

“She’s in good shape,” said Marshal Oldman after talking to his 74-year-old client. “She’s a very happy person right now.”

The search for Drexler ended suddenly Wednesday when an anonymous caller told authorities where she could be found, a day after legal secretary Lillian Kahn, 50, and her daughter, Cynthia Deaver, 20, had been arrested in the case and booked for investigation of kidnaping for extortion.

“Apparently Lillian (Kahn) had placed her with some fellow that Lillian knew,” Oldman said. “That fellow took good care of her for the night, and then drove her up to her neighborhood and dropped her off. I have no idea who that person is.

“I don’t think she (Drexler) has a real clear understanding of what’s been going on. I think she was convinced by the people around her that the judge was a crook and out to take her property and fleece her generally.

“She seems to think that she has been misled all these months, and she’s sorry she met all these people. She feels she has been taken advantage of.”

Drexler, who was earlier reported to be “confused, disoriented” and unable to express herself sensibly, was placed under the public guardian’s conservatorship after it was determined in a court hearing that she was unable to care for her estimated $2-million estate.

But when deputy public defenders went to her home on May 17, a man identified as Moises Vasquez, 25, who had been living at her home, drove Drexler away, authorities said. During the next several weeks, Drexler lived with a family, entered a hospital for treatment of an injured hip and spent time in a convalescent hospital, checking out on Aug. 4 and disappearing.

Superior Court Judge Miriam A. Vogel held hearings in an attempt to find Drexler and called in the district attorney’s office and Los Angeles Police Department to investigate. Vogel feared that Drexler had been kidnaped and held against her will.

Acting on information supplied by Oldman, detectives reported they found that Drexler had been in Palm Springs on Aug. 11 with Kahn and Deaver.

The mother and daughter were arrested at a West Hollywood hotel on Tuesday. Kahn was identified as an associate of Drexler’s former attorney, Thomas Carver, who had been jailed for several days for refusing to disclose Drexler’s whereabouts.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Lonnie Felker said Thursday that it may be early next week before a decision is made on whether to file charges against Kahn and Deaver.