Landlady Ordered to Stand Trial on 9 Counts of Murder

Dorothea Puente, the grandmotherly landlady charged with poisoning nine tenants to get their pension and disability benefits, was ordered Tuesday to stand trial for murder.

The white-haired Puente, 61, showed no emotion as Municipal Judge Gail Ohanesian ruled “there is ample circumstantial evidence . . . that death was by criminal means.”

Puente was ordered to stand trial on the nine counts with which she had been charged. She could face the death penalty if convicted.

She has pleaded not guilty, and defense attorneys insist she will be acquitted.

“This hearing has proved only that Dorothea Puente didn’t report their deaths,” defense lawyer Peter Vlautin said. “Anything else is speculation.”

Puente was arrested after a social worker complained to police that one of her clients--a roomer in Puente’s downtown home--had disappeared.

In November, 1988, authorities dug up seven bodies from the yard of the Victorian-style dwelling. Puente was later implicated in two other deaths--that of a woman who died of a drug overdose allegedly at Puente’s house, and that of another tenant whose body was found in a wooden box in a neighboring county.

The key prosecution evidence in the case was testimony that traces of Dalmane, a tranquilizer, was found in all seven of the bodies found in Puente’s yard. But the bodies, buried anywhere from weeks to years, were too decomposed for autopsies to determine the cause of death.

Deputy Dist. Atty. George Williamson said Puente poisoned her victims so she could cash their Social Security and government benefit checks.

Defense attorneys vigorously contested the evidence during the eight-week preliminary hearing, arguing that the victims--mostly elderly, in poor health, and alcoholic--died of natural causes.

Puente had been sentenced to prison in 1982 for administering stupefying drugs and robbing victims she met in bars.

Puente will be arraigned July 10 in Sacramento County Superior Court. She remains in jail without bail.