Murder Suspect Plotting Deaths of Judge, 2 Others, Officials Say

A 32-year-old former San Fernando Valley security guard, charged with the first-degree murder of a Brentwood high school student, has been plotting the murder of a Los Angeles Municipal Court judge, a county prosecutor and a police investigator involved in the case, officials said today.

The suspect is Rodney D. Garmanian, who has been held without bail since his arrest on charges of kidnaping, raping, robbing and murdering Teak Dyer on June 22.

The judge, David M. Horwitz, and the prosecutor, Deputy Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. Harvey Giss, have been placed under around-the-clock protection, as has the as-yet unnamed detective, officials in the district attorney’s office said.

Horwitz in mid-August presided over a nine-day preliminary hearing, at the end of which he ordered Garmanian to stand trial for the 18-year-old girl’s murder. The trial is currently set to begin in January in Santa Monica Superior Court. If convicted, Garmanian could get the death penalty.

Dyer, a Palisades High School senior, was found shot to death in the restroom in a commercial building on Sunset Boulevard. Her wrists bore bruises that suggested she had been handcuffed.