Dead Actress Linked to CHP Officer Who Committed Suicide in May

A British stripper and actress, found dead with her husband’s body in Sherman Oaks, was romantically involved with a CHP officer who killed himself last month, apparently after she rejected the officer’s marriage proposal, Los Angeles police said Tuesday.

Detectives also are increasingly skeptical that the woman’s husband took part in a double suicide, as was initially believed, and instead suspect that she killed him before ending her life, Officer Paul Stewart said.

Victoria Howden, 26, who had a bit part on the TV sitcom “Dear John” last fall, and Charles House, 40, who was training to become a police officer for the Los Angeles Unified School District, were found dead of gunshot wounds in their Sherman Oaks apartment Monday.

“We’re finding absolutely no reason for Mr. House to commit suicide,” said Stewart, adding that he was reluctant to make a final conclusion that Howden killed House until autopsy and forensic reports are complete. “We’ve already talked to people that know him the best and think things were going well” for him, Stewart said.

House had planned a trip with his two children from an earlier marriage, Stewart said, and was excelling in the Los Angeles Unified School District’s police academy at Rio Hondo College. His alarm clock was set, his lunch packed, and his uniform ready as if he planned to attend class the next morning, Stewart said.

Howden, on the other hand, left a note in which she apologized for her death and asked to be buried near Ronald Webb, 34, a California Highway Patrol officer found shot to death with his own gun on May 8, Stewart said.

Webb also left a note that mentioned Howden, Stewart said. Howden’s friends told police she was despondent over Webb’s death, and that he committed suicide after she rejected his marriage proposal, Stewart said.

Howden and House were married six months ago in Las Vegas, according to a relative of House. The relative asked to remain anonymous, as did other family members interviewed.

Stewart said “the up-front reason” for the marriage between House and Howden was to qualify Howden, a native of England, to work in the United States. Howden worked as a stripper at private parties, he said.

On May 9, the day after Webb’s body was found, she went to the home of Webb’s estranged wife, threatening to commit suicide, and was held by Ventura County sheriff’s deputies for 72 hours for psychiatric evaluation, Stewart said.

The detective said Howden’s .357 magnum handgun was found near her in a bedroom of the apartment. She had been shot once in the chest. House, whose gun was locked in his car, was shot in the head, Stewart said.

Howden phoned a friend about 2 a.m. saying House had just shot himself and she didn’t know what to do, police said. The friend’s husband tried to keep her on the phone but when paramedics arrived they found her dead.

House’s family expressed doubt that he would kill himself.

House, once a Los Angeles sheriff’s deputy, returned to his native Paducah, Ky., after a fellow deputy was killed in the line of duty in 1978, relatives said. He became a police officer in his hometown, which he thought was a better place to raise children.

The family returned to Southern California four years ago. House and his wife were divorced two years ago. He was devoted to his children, 12 and 8, and had made plans with them for Father’s Day, relatives said.

“He should have never left there,” one relative said in reference to Kentucky. “That was more his own environment than this.”