2 Plead Guilty to Threatening Divorced Man

Two men accused of threatening a Laguna Beach man with a burning road flare if he didn’t cooperate with his ex-wife in a property settlement pleaded guilty Friday and were placed on probation.

In crediting the two men with jail time already served, Superior Court Judge Donald A. McCartin said he believed the defendants had learned their lesson and would not likely become involved in anything like that again.

Richard William Nimmo, 52, of Newport Beach and Ralph Thomas Pueschel, 30, of Grand Terrace in San Bernardino County, pleaded guilty to assault, extortion, conspiracy and false imprisonment. Nimmo was credited with three months in the Orange County Jail. Pueschel has served two months.

Although prosecutors say no deals were made in exchange for the guilty pleas, both men are expected to testify against Helen Westin Ruppert, 61, who is awaiting trial on charges of assault, extortion and conspiracy.

Prosecutors say that on Jan. 22 Nimmo and Pueschel accosted Ruppert’s ex-husband, Harold, 65, at a house the divorced couple shared and threatened him if he did not sign papers agreeing to a property settlement.

Although the Rupperts had been divorced for five years, they shared the house--she living upstairs--because they could not agree on a settlement.

Harold Ruppert told authorities the two men assaulted him just a few minutes after his ex-wife called him in his half of the house and asked: “Are you ready to settle yet?”

Harold Ruppert said that it was Nimmo who lighted a flare and held it near his upper thigh.

“I could feel the heat through my pants,” Ruppert said Friday in an interview. “I was scared for my life.”

He told authorities that Nimmo had said, “ ‘How would you like to feel your flesh burn?’ ”

He said Nimmo also told him: “Sign these papers or you’re a dead man.”

He said Nimmo also threatened to kill him if he didn’t have the papers notarized within 48 hours.

After the two men left, Harold Ruppert called the police. Nimmo and Pueschel were arrested a few minutes later.

Ruppert, a nightclub owner with other real estate holdings in California and Oklahoma, said he immediately signed over the house to his ex-wife, along with stock valued at several hundred thousand dollars and other property.

Helen Ruppert has denied she hired the two men to threaten her ex-husband. She remains free on $250,000 bail.

Friday, Deputy Dist. Atty. Edward Thomas Dunn Jr. objected to McCartin’s sentence for Nimmo and Pueschel, saying it was too lenient.

Dunn had agreed to the guilty plea without making a recommendation for a specific sentence, leaving it up to the court. The two had faced a maximum sentence of three years in state prison each. And earlier in their case, one judge had offered them two-year sentences in exchange for their guilty pleas.

“It was mammoth light for Nimmo, who actually held the flare,” Dunn said. “But I think the judge figured this was a couple of crazy guys who just got in over their heads.”

While Dunn said he did not negotiate with the two in exchange for their guilty pleas, “both have said they want to testify at her trial and tell the truth about what happened.”

Asked if the two men had been paid, Dunn said: “That’s a good question. We’re anxious to interview them and find out.”

Dunn also objected to the judge sentencing the two immediately after taking their guilty plea, without a chance for a probation report. It also means Harold Ruppert did not have the opportunity to come into court and make a statement at the sentencing. The judge noted the prosecutor’s objection and went ahead.