Ex-Mayor’s Roommate to Face Trial in Slaying : Crime: Prosecutors have agreed not to seek the death penalty for the former San Fernando official’s killing. Michael Sagor was robbed, beaten, strangled and shot.

A former roommate of ex-San Fernando Mayor Michael Sagor was ordered Wednesday to stand trial on charges he killed Sagor earlier this year.

Andreas (Andrew) Bechtler, 26, who lived with Sagor for nearly six years, is scheduled to be arraigned Nov. 12 in San Fernando Superior Court on murder and robbery charges.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Susan Chasworth tried to add to the murder charge the special circumstance that it was committed for financial gain, which would have allowed her to seek the death penalty.

However, Municipal Judge Roy Carstairs did not allow it after Deputy Public Defender Mitch Bruckner said there was an agreement that prosecutors would not seek the death penalty. Bruckner called the move to amend the charges “outrageous and below board.”

Outside the courtroom, Chasworth said she was not aware of any such agreement, and that evidence in the case warranted adding the special circumstance. However, she said, she would discuss the matter with Billy Webb, head of the district attorney’s office in San Fernando, before pursuing it.

Neither Webb nor Bill Weiss, head of the public defender’s office in San Fernando, could be reached for comment.

During the half-day preliminary hearing Wednesday, Sheriff’s Detective Joe Seeger testified that Bechtler turned himself in to police in San Francisco and admitted killing Sagor, who was 47.

Seeger said Bechtler told them he met Sagor on Santa Monica Boulevard in West Hollywood about six years ago, and immediately moved in with him.

According to his statement to police, Bechtler said Sagor was like a father to him, and that there was not a sexual relationship. He described the relationship as stormy because of his own addiction to drugs. Bechtler, an admitted prostitute, said the relationship ended earlier this year after he contracted the AIDS virus.

Bechtler told police that he was drug-free for about a week before the killing in April, and that he planned to steal money and property from Sagor, and then go to Canada.

Bechtler decided to kill Sagor because he feared Sagor would follow him to Canada and try to bring him back. According to the police statement, Bechtler clubbed Sagor with a cane until it broke. He then tried strangling Sagor with a cord. When Sagor still did not appear to be dead, Bechtler shot him in the head, police said.

Bechtler said he took about $5,000 and 10 rings, then took Sagor’s car and drove to San Francisco, where he went on a drug binge. When he ran out of money, he turned himself in to police and confessed to killing Sagor.

Bruckner said his client lied about several things in his statement to police--including his true sexual relationship with Sagor and about being drug-free--because Bechtler was feeling depressed about Sagor’s death and having acquired the AIDS virus, and wanted to die.

Sagor was mayor of San Fernando during 1980 and served as city administrator from 1980-82.