Slayings Stir Review of Sales Policies on Handguns : ‘This is a good, tragic example of why we so desperately need waiting periods and background checks.’ --Eric Ellman, National Coalition to Ban Handguns

The killing of five people in Universal City and Albuquerque, allegedly by a man obsessed with hunting Nazis, has prompted a soul-searching review of handgun policies in the New Mexico city that prides itself on its rugged Western identity.

As Nathan Trupp awaits arraignment in Los Angeles in the shooting deaths of two Universal Studios security guards, Albuquerque Mayor Ken Schultz is asking his city’s gun shop owners to attend a meeting with city officials Wednesday.

Schultz said he wants to discuss possible regulations that might have prevented Trupp, a former mental patient, from acquiring the handgun allegedly used to kill the guards Dec. 1 and three other people earlier that week at an Albuquerque bagel shop.

The measures include imposing a waiting period for gun purchases to give shop owners time to check into their customers’ backgrounds. In the past, gun shop operators complained, police have refused to perform such checks, and Schultz is now responding by ordering them to be more cooperative.

Mike Santullo, the mayor’s press spokesman, called these proposals a first step toward preventing future tragedies. Santullo admitted that implementation of a waiting period would have to be voluntary because New Mexico’s constitution forbids its cities from enacting gun control laws.

“This is New Mexico,” Santullo said. “They pride themselves on their Western ways.”

The gun control effort underscores the impact on the city of the killing of three people in the Bagel Lovers shop Nov. 29, allegedly by Trupp, 42, a mentally disturbed artist who moved to Albuquerque in May from New Jersey.

Afterward, Trupp took a bus to Los Angeles and shot security guards Jeren Beeks, 27, of La Crescenta and Armando Torres, 18, of East Los Angeles at the Universal Studios lot, according to police.

The guards had refused to put Trupp in contact with actor-producer Michael Landon, who police believe was Trupp’s prime target.

He reportedly raged that Landon, star of television’s “Highway to Heaven”--and the son of a Jew--was a Nazi.

Trupp has been talking to investigators while hospitalized in the Jail Ward of County-USC Medical Center with chest and arm injuries he received in a gun duel with a sheriff’s deputy at Universal Studios.

The investigation, however, has so far turned up as many questions as answers. How could a man with a 30-year history of nonviolent mental problems, who was said to be terrified of everything from guns to insects, suddenly turn into an executioner? Once he did, how could he--when his mental confusion kept him unemployed--escape Albuquerque police so easily? And, finally, how could a man manage to purchase a gun after raving only minutes before to a cab driver that Nazis had put his mother into a coma?

He bought the gun at The Gun Room, where he filled out a federal form that asked if he had ever been institutionalized for mental problems. He lied and said no.

Because New Mexico, unlike California, does not require a background check of handgun buyers, his lie was not exposed. Because New Mexico requires no waiting period before a gun purchase, Trupp could plunk down his cash and walk out with a .38-caliber special, five-shot revolver.

Calling him a “lunatic,” Trupp’s uncle, Garrison Trupp of Baltimore, who was once close to his nephew, said he could not understand how anybody “would sell this person a gun.”

Said Eric Ellman, political affairs director of the National Coalition to Ban Handguns in Washington: “This is a good, tragic example of why we so desperately need waiting periods and background checks.”

In Albuquerque’s Shalako Apartments on old Highway 66, Trupp’s neighbors said he was “a loner” who kept to himself and never bothered anyone.

Apartment manager Ralph Woods, however, said he overheard Trupp suddenly blow up in rage as he talked on the pay phone outside the apartment office. “If any little thing went wrong, he would kind of explode,” Woods said.

Trupp is reported to have been seeing a psychiatrist in Albuquerque. Authorities say they will subpoena his medical records.

In fact, Trupp presents at least two sides.

A painfully withdrawn man who is 6 feet tall and weighs 160 pounds, he would not meet neighbors’ eyes and would be seen standing on a bridge watching traffic for long periods. Yet he could be friendly.

Mental problems came early to Trupp, who began to retreat into himself in fright at about 13, said his brother, Philip, a Washington writer. Nathan was so scared of his brother’s air gun that Philip had to get rid of it.

Nathan was taken on as an apprentice by a Japanese ceramist, who pronounced him talented. And he did the things people of his generation did, heading to San Francisco in the late ‘60s to study art and to participate in the feast of love and friendship. Footloose, he traveled to Israel to work on a kibbutz.

There, he probably met Holocaust survivors and heard about Nazi atrocities, his brother said. Whether that experience planted the poisonous seed in his mind that would blossom years later is still not known.

Birthdays seemed to precipitate crises for Trupp. On Nov. 25, 1987, four days short of his 41st birthday, he apparently went to a mental health clinic complaining that voices were telling him to commit suicide and was involuntarily committed to Trenton Psychiatric Hospital. He stayed there until April 4, when he was released “in good shape,” said an official.

Then he hit the road, living off a $100,000 trust fund left him by relatives. “By the time he made it out West, the voices were telling him to hurt other people,” said one person close to the case who asked not to be identified. Trupp landed in Albuquerque and telephoned his brother that it was a lovely place and that he should come visit.

He tried to work, soliciting donations for the Fraternal Order of Police, but was let go because he had trouble processing information.

Cab Called

On the day before his 42nd birthday, Monday, Nov. 28, Trupp phoned for a cab and waited in the Shalako office since it was cold. As usual, he had little to say to the proprietors.

But he seemed to hit it off with Wayne Key, the cab driver who met him about 9 a.m. Trupp, dressed in a knit cap, a ski jacket and jeans, said he needed to go to the Department of Motor Vehicles to get a New Mexico identification card so that he could buy a gun. Quizzed by Key, Trupp said he was not a hunter, but needed a gun to kill a Nazi.

Key said he thought the remark odd, but not that frightening. He said he gets a lot of strange people in his cab, and “he paid me to listen to him.”

Riding in the taxi, Trupp noticed that the street lights were still on and told Key that that was a sign from his God. Key identified the deity Trupp spoke of as “El Jeno,” but he may have misheard the word Elohim, the Jewish word for God in his judgmental role.

The cab driver and his customer drove past the Bagel Lovers on a route that also would take them to The Gun Room and a target range, where Trupp practiced shooting his new gun. Trupp remarked that the food at the bagel shop was bad and said that if Key ate there, “my intestines would be filled with pus,” the driver recalled.

Trupp also talked about people who had been to heaven and come back to Earth. He mentioned a wrestling manager and an actor, although Key is not sure that the name was Landon. In “Highway to Heaven,” Landon plays an angel.

The actor’s publicist, Harry Flynn, said some people actually believe the show’s premise: “We’ve had people, kids mostly, who really believe he must be an angel.”

It is unclear how that squares with Trupp’s assertions--which still continue--that Landon is a Nazi, except that Trupp seems to apply that label to people who cross him. Now he reportedly insists that the security guards at Universal who failed to put him in touch with Landon were Nazis too, authorities said.

Key said that when Trupp got out of the cab at the gun shop, he dropped perhaps the biggest hint of trouble to come, asking the driver: “Do you think I will get away with it?”

“Sure, I guess,” Key replied. Although saying he now wishes that he had warned somebody about Trupp’s strange behavior, he explained: “I went along with the guy because he said a lot of weird stuff.”

Trupp celebrated his birthday early Nov. 29 by riding his bicycle around in circles in the parking lot of the Shalako Apartments. Woods watched him awhile.

Then Trupp allegedly went to the Bagel Lovers shop 2 miles away and shot and killed three people: the owner-operators, Jeanne Wilt, 37; her husband, Richard, 39, and her father, Joseph Famiglietta, 62.

A maintenance man at the apartments saw Trupp later that day walking with his head down, Woods said. Key, who watched an Eddie Murphy movie on videocassette that night instead of the news, did not hear about the killings until Wednesday morning.

About 9 a.m. Wednesday, Trupp went to the apartment office to pay his $285 monthly rent, Woods said. Meanwhile, Key heard the news and called police. About 9:15 a.m., they began staking out the apartment and, at 10:15 a.m., the SWAT team arrived and surrounded it.

By that time, Trupp had somehow slipped away. He showed up at a bank about 10 a.m., where he withdrew some money from an automatic teller machine. Then he went to the Greyhound bus terminal and caught the 12:30 p.m. bus for Los Angeles, which arrived the next morning at 5.

Motel Stay

About 6 a.m. Dec. 1, he checked into the Hollywood Land Motel near Universal Studios and may have slept for a few hours. All he had to guide him toward Landon were some hand-written notes with phone numbers, the actor’s name and possible addresses where he might be located. Later that day, he went to Universal Studios and took a tour, then returned that evening to the employees’ entrance to ask for Landon. It was there that he confronted Beeks and Torres.

Beeks, 27, one of the guards that police say Trupp shot, was a shy man who came out of his shell after joining the Glendale Jaycees several years ago. He won the club’s “Speak Up” award for his growing assertiveness and was always the guy at large club gatherings walking up with his hand out to introduce himself.

“Of all the Jaycees, he worked harder than anybody,” said Jack Kauffman, a fellow member and former Jaycees president. Beeks would spend evenings on the telephone or work on club business at his parents’ kitchen table. His last project was the Santa Phone, in which Jaycees pretending to be Santa Claus or his elves answer phone calls from children in the community.

The other slain guard, Torres, 18, like Trupp--who rode his mountain bike aimlessly around Albuquerque--was an avid bicycle rider. In riding colors and bike pants and a helmet, he rode with his club around Southern California.

Torres was handy. He made tables for the family and upholstered the 1971 Plymouth Duster that he drove around town. In July, he started working at Universal, turning over his paycheck to his mother to help pay the bills on their 2-bedroom house. He usually patrolled the movie lot in a car, but on Dec. 1, Torres was assigned to the gate at the employees’ entrance.

Since it was Torres’ first day at that post, Beeks agreed to work overtime to show him the ropes.

“I raised a responsibility-aholic, and that probably killed him,” said his father, John Beeks.

That morning, the guard had called Marie Cojulun, president of the Glendale Jaycees, with whom he was to meet that night to discuss preparations for the Santa Phone. He had volunteered to work late, he said, so they agreed to meet on the weekend instead.

Visits Studio

Sometime in the afternoon, according to sheriff’s reports, Trupp made his way to Universal and asked around about Landon. He didn’t seem crazed. He was clean, shaved and pretty average-looking to the people who saw him.

Whatever he was told eventually led him to the employees’ gate.

Beeks had greeted plenty of celebrities there and generally thought them all pleasant. Amy Irving and Ernest Borgnine were favorites. Beeks even broke his own code of professionalism to get an autograph from Borgnine.

A dark-haired man approached. As Beeks turned to face him, Trupp, without a word, allegedly shot him.

Then he shot Torres inside the guard booth, according to authorities. Before fleeing, he once again shot Beeks, who was lying on the ground outside the booth, according to reports. A sheriff’s squad car rolled up, and gunfire was exchanged, leaving Trupp wounded, authorities said.

Trupp faces two counts of first-degree murder in the guards’ slayings, including special-circumstance allegations that could bring the death penalty.

On Saturday, a cordon of fellow security officers stood at attention outside a Glendale chapel, where Beeks was remembered in a memorial service as a man who wanted to serve others.

An overflow crowd of about 400 co-workers, family members, friends, Jaycees and others attended the service at Forest Lawn Memorial Park.

“This young man was the most positive individual I ever came across,” Kauffman said.

Jim Chappell, a medical worker who was admitted to the film lot by Beeks just 10 minutes before the shooting, recited a poem written in Beeks’ memory. “Close your eyes . . . you will again see me waving you on.”

Torres was buried Wednesday at Resurrection Cemetery in East Los Angeles after memorial services attended by about 300 people, many of them the guards with whom he worked.

Times Staff Writer Bob Pool contributed to this story.