Suspect’s Companion Held in Slayings at CityWalk : Investigation: Woman who called authorities from freeway shortly after the killings is booked on suspicion of murder.

Sheriff’s investigators arrested a second suspect Friday in the bloody Mother’s Day slayings at Universal CityWalk, taking into custody the woman companion of a man arrested Thursday on suspicion of murdering his mother and former girlfriend.

Dressed in a pink bathrobe and clutching a pillow to her injured abdomen, Donna K. Lee, 44, of North Hollywood was quickly wheeled out of a Panorama City hospital, helped into an unmarked police car car, given a medical checkup at County-USC Hospital and booked at the Sybil Brand women’s jail on suspicion of murder.

She lived with Paul Carasi, 30, who was arrested Thursday evening at the sheriff’s crime laboratory in Downtown Los Angeles immediately after flunking a polygraph test that he volunteered to take, Deputy Barbara McWilliams said.

“We know he was lying to us,” McWilliams said. “He was deceptive in answering all of the questions.”

Lee and Carasi were arrested on suspicion of the knife killings of Doris Carasi, 61, and Sonia Salinas, 29, whose throats were cut as they returned to their car late Sunday evening after a Mother’s Day dinner at the Country Star restaurant on the Universal CityWalk promenade.

“We believe the two people in custody are the two people who participated in this and that it was an isolated case,” Sheriff’s Deputy Barbara McWilliams said after Lee’s arrest.

Deputies said no motive had been established for the killings and forensic testing is needed to determine who slashed the two women’s throats.

Lee phoned for help from a call box on the Hollywood Freeway roughly four miles from CityWalk about 15 minutes after the two women were found dead on the top level of a parking structure in the amusement park. Lee was bleeding from a slashed abdomen and a minor back wound when CHP officers arrived. Authorities said Friday that they have now placed Lee at the crime scene.

Sheriff’s Sgt. Sam Muniz said that Lee told authorities she was at CityWalk the evening of the killings. “She was there for one reason . . . to be with Paul,” Muniz said.

“Donna Lee was on the fifth floor of the parking structure in a red 1992 Beretta,” Sheriff’s Deputy Britta Tubbs said. “If anybody has seen her there and has any information they are being asked to contact the sheriff’s homicide bureau.”

Muniz said that investigators believe that Lee stopped alongside the freeway to dump property that belonged to the victims, including fanny packs belonging to Doris and Paul Carasi, Salinas’ purse and a bloody butcher knife that deputies said could have been used in the CityWalk stabbings.

“She stopped to get rid of the property, but she couldn’t drive off because she had locked herself out of her car,” Muniz said.

McWilliams said Lee initially told investigators that she was attacked at the call box, but later changed her story to say she was attacked at CityWalk. McWilliams added that authorities believe Lee sustained her wounds at CityWalk. Earlier in the week, Sheriff Sherman Block said it was possible that Lee’s wounds were self-inflicted.

Lee lived with Paul Carasi in the same North Hollywood apartment complex where his mother lived with Salinas and Salinas’ 2-year-old son by Carasi. Authorities said Friday that the boy has been placed in the custody of his grandparents.

Paul Carasi, Lee and Salinas all worked together at a Bank of America data processing center in Downtown Los Angeles.

Neighbors at the North Hollywood apartment where they all lived said there were tensions between Donna Lee and Doris Carasi.

One neighbor, who asked not to be identified, said he saw Doris Carasi hit Lee in the head with a pair of keys during a fight three weeks ago. The man said Doris Carasi was angry that Lee was living with her son.

Neighbors said Doris was disheartened that Paul had left Salinas for Lee.

Paul Carasi, who suffered cuts on his thumb and arm at the time of the killings, originally told investigators that he was cut after he was attacked from behind by an assailant. He said that he became dazed during the attack and that when he regained consciousness he discovered that his mother and Salinas had been stabbed.

Sheriff’s deputies continued their investigation throughout the week as Carasi made funeral plans, often flanked by friends, including one who described Carasi as being in a state of disbelief over the slayings. But on Thursday, Carasi agreed to meet with sheriff’s investigators to take a polygraph test, after which he was arrested.

Sheriff’s deputies said they plan to ask prosecutors to file an array of charges by Monday against Lee and Carasi, who has requested an attorney.