Jailed Madame Cleared of Ties to Area Killings

Karen L. Wilkening, the San Diego madame who prosecutors say ran a high-class call-girl ring out of a Linda Vista condominium, is “not closely connected” to any of the cases being examined by a special task force investigating the killings of 40 prostitutes and other women, the San Diego County Sheriff’s Department said this week.

The sheriff’s statement, in a news release dated Monday, is the first official acknowledgement that Wilkening did not have information vital to the inquiry by the San Diego Metropolitan Homicide Task Force, which is investigating the slayings.

Since her forcible return from the Philippines last May, there has been considerable speculation that Wilkening might be able to provide authorities with leads in the troubling series of slayings, which began with the 1985 slaying of Donna Marie Gentile, a former prostitute.

In the news release issued Monday, the Sheriff’s Department said that Wilkening and Gentile “may have known each other.” That, “combined with other factors,” the statement continued, “made the Wilkening case a stone that simply could not be left unturned in the investigation.”

Authorities are known to have questioned Wilkening extensively during the almost one year since her return from the Philippines. Apparently, investigators are satisfied that her knowledge was peripheral to the homicide investigations.

In November, a Superior Court judge sentenced Wilkening to 3 years and 8 months in prison following her guilty plea to two felony counts in connection with the prostitution ring.

In 1987, while facing charges emanating from the call-girl service, Wilkening fled to Asia, using a passport issued in the name of a friend. Last May, agents of the special task force investigating the killings found Wilkening in the Philippines and brought her back. Nearly $20,000 was spent in returning her to San Diego, a fact that fueled speculation that she might have information on the 40 unsolved killings.

Wilkening is not a suspect in the slayings and has never been a suspect, according to the Sheriff’s Department.

Adding intrigue to Wilkening’s already curious case were reports that her clients included well-known and influential customers whose names may have been “sanitized” from her files.