‘I’m Scared,’ Says Luby; Reward Told

Saying that he still fears for his life, financier Roger W. Luby summoned reporters to his lavish Newport Beach home Wednesday after more than a week of seclusion to describe how he and girlfriend Aissa Wayne, daughter of the late actor John Wayne, were bound, beaten and threatened with death.

Flanked by attorney Christopher Norgaard on the sunlit patio of his $3-million estate, Luby announced that friends have offered a $100,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of the attackers. But he maintained that he “hasn’t a clue” as to what prompted the attack, or whom the gunmen, whom he described as “professional hit men,” were after.

He declined to name those offering the reward.

Luby said he is recovering slowly from the Oct. 3 attack, in which he suffered a slashed right Achilles’ tendon, a fractured nose, and a bruised and cut face. But he said doctors have told him he is expected to regain almost complete use of his right leg and foot.

“It’s frustrating and confusing and frankly I’m scared,” Luby said. Except for his right leg, encased in a cast for at least the next 14 weeks, Luby, tan and fit, bears almost no traces of the brutal attack.

He said he has become “sort of a prisoner” on the grounds of his chalet-style home, conducting business by phone. He has a full-time bodyguard now, and he has hired a private investigator, he said.

Luby confirmed statements by Wayne about the shouted death threat. But although Wayne quoted one of the gunmen as saying: “You’re messing with the wrong guy; next time we’ll kill you,” Luby said he heard: “You’re (expletive) with the wrong people.”

Luby said he does not know the significance of the warning. He disputed an assertion of Pilar Wayne, Aissa’s mother, who said her daughter told her that Luby had received mysterious phone calls before the attack. “I have never had a warning--there have been no phone calls post-, during or pre-incident,” he said.

The two attackers--armed with pistols and dressed as construction workers--followed Luby and Wayne into his electronically gated home about 10 a.m. and jumped them after they got out of the car. The attack lasted only three or four minutes. Luby said he thought he would be killed. He never felt the slash--of either a razor blade or a small knife--that partially severed his Achilles’ tendon, he said.

Luby said he and Aissa Wayne still see each other, but Wayne was not at the press conference Wednesday and is reportedly recovering from plastic surgery to treat a deep gash over her right eye suffered in the attack. She could not be reached for comment.

Newport Beach police spokesman Robert Oakley said Wednesday that investigators are still poring over evidence in the case, which has attracted international press attention. But there have been few clues, and the assailants are still at large.

“We are looking at all of the personal and business contacts of both Luby and Wayne,” Oakley said. “There is no single avenue of inquiry that we could point to at this point as most promising. It is still wide open.”

Both Luby and Wayne are involved in divorces, and Luby is in the midst of litigation over a multimillion-dollar redevelopment project that collapsed and forced him into bankruptcy last year.

Police have said that the attack appeared to be a warning directed at Luby because the attackers knew his name and confirmed his identity.

A 1984 renovation of the historic Broadway building at Broadway and 4th Street in downtown Los Angeles was halted when a group of Oklahoma investors allegedly reneged on a deal to finance the project. Luby filed for personal bankruptcy last year after putting up “several hundred thousand dollars” of his own money to finance the project.

Luby said Wednesday that he had no indications that the attack might be linked to the development project. But he declined to respond when asked whether his personal debts were serious enough to prompt the attack.