Man of Many Aliases Returns to Courthouse : Fraud case: Authorities say they have a con artist in custody who has cheated Ventura businesses and Ojai residents.

Just when you thought you’d heard the last of him--and his 11 aliases--David Michael Murray, also known as Shi Stone and Shane Peterson, has returned to the courts of Ventura County.

Murray--an alleged con artist who claims to be a misunderstood 17-year-old--appeared at a Ventura Muncipal Court hearing on Wednesday to determine whether he will stand trial on 12 counts of defrauding Ventura businesses and Ojai residents of more than $4,000.

Officials believe that Murray is a 31-year-old con artist with a criminal record in six states. He is being held without bail in the Ventura County Jail because of charges that he twice violated his parole--once in Texas and once in Ventura, where he was convicted of auto theft in 1980.

But for four weeks beginning in late January, Murray claimed to be Shi Stone, the hemophiliac son of an Army officer wounded in the U.S. invasion of Panama. By the time he was arrested, many Ojai residents believed his story.

Included in the 12 counts Murray faces are two that were refiled by the district attorney’s office after a municipal court judge dismissed them in March.

One of the counts charges Murray with defrauding his benefactors, Ken and Dorothy Johnson, of room and board expenses. The Ojai couple sheltered the boy for four weeks, believing that he was Shi Stone.

The district attorney’s office also refiled a charge that Murray bilked a local pharmacist of a blood coagulant worth $1,600 to treat his hemophilia--a condition that prevents blood from clotting normally.

The district attorney’s office also filed another seven felony and three misdemeanor counts for incidents in which Murray allegedly bilked hotel keepers and store owners in Ventura out of money for products and services.

About 15 hotel clerks and business owners testified Wednesday that Murray allegedly used similar scams to defraud them before taking up residence with the Johnsons.

Marcia Lee Stratton, a desk clerk at the Holiday Inn Beach Resort in Ventura, said a man who identified himself as Randy Phillips arrived at the hotel and reported that his luggage had been lost. He told her his money and credit cards were in the bags but that the airline would soon contact the hotel about restitution, Stratton said.

“He was distraught about it so I gave him the best room and he said he’d get back to me as soon as he could,” Stratton said.

Stratton said Wednesday in court that she was “75% sure” that Phillips and Murray are the same man.

The hotel has yet to receive the $116 payment for Murray’s two-night stay in early January, Deputy Dist. Atty. Charles R. Roberts said.

Other witnesses testified that Murray impersonated a fashion model, an officer in the U.S. Air Force and the son of a photographer for the television show “Wide World of Sports.”

In many cases, Murray would follow up his claims with official-looking Western Union telegrams that promised money from the companies that he said would be paying his expenses, prosecutors contend.

In other testimony Wednesday from witnesses called by prosecutors, Robert James III, a physician and director of the laboratory at the Ventura County Medical Center, said that two tests performed on Murray’s blood showed that he was not a classic hemophiliac, as he had claimed. But James could not rule out the possibility that Murray had a less common type of hemophilia.

Municipal Court Judge John E. Dobroth is expected to decide today if Murray will stand trial on the 12 charges after hearing testimony from about 15 more witnesses.