Death in the Family : As Trial Set to Begin, Grim Memories Linger at Lisi Slaying Site

The gardeners and salespeople who’ve left handbills at this ghostly quiet ranch house on Louise Street probably stepped right over the bullet holes in the concrete path out front.

But they must have figured out by now that no one lives here.

It’s been just over two years since Kenneth Lisi, an executive with the Walt Disney Co.’s theme park division, was shot to death on this spot, allegedly by his estranged mother-in-law. It was a gruesome Halloween night on a residential street, and a family already torn by divorce and allegations of child abuse now found itself racked by allegations of murder.

The jury was chosen Monday in Van Nuys Superior Court in the trial of Jo Lula Haynes, a 75-year-old grandmother who once taught school and worked as a baby sitter.

But two years after the crime, the case continues to take strange turns.

The victim’s estranged wife, Pamela Lisi, invoked her Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination two weeks ago in court. During a hearing in which the prosecution attempted to force her to testify against her mother, she refused to answer a series of 10 questions posed by prosecutor Carole Chizever.

Pamela Lisi had lost custody of the couple’s two children 10 weeks before the killing and, after her husband’s death and a court battle, collected on his $600,000-plus life insurance policy.

Chizever said she is prosecuting an open-and-shut murder case. Three witnesses--including the victim’s parents--will testify that they saw Haynes shoot Lisi on the front walk of the house on Louise Street.

“She lured him there and then she shot him,” Chizever said. The prosecution has agreed not to ask for the death penalty, but the charge of murder while lying in wait for the victim is considered a “special circumstance” and carries a penalty of life in prison without parole. Haynes has pleaded not guilty.

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The children, sent at first to a foster home, now live with their mother. The house on Louise Street is closed up, whitewash barely covering the outside woodwork and blinds drawn over the big front windows. A hook that looks as if it once held a wreath hangs empty on the white-painted front door.

It’s impossible to see inside. But in there, somehow, a suburban life turned deadly.

The marital turmoil was well under way when Lisi first moved out of the house on Louise Street in 1992. He had lived there with Pamela, Haynes and the two girls for most of nearly 15 years of marriage. Shortly after, his wife made what was to be the first of several accusations that he had molested his youngest daughter, then 4 years old. He later filed for divorce.

Here, the story gets a little muddy: As often happens when a family turns in on itself, different sides tell vastly divergent stories about what really happened and who the real villains were.

The molestation allegations were never proved, and the district attorney refused to file charges, despite repeated requests by Pamela Lisi. Law enforcement sources investigating the death of Lisi say flat out that the contentions weren’t true.

Nevertheless, when Haynes was arrested, she told police that Lisi “was hurting” his daughter. And, she said, he was trying to cheat her out of her equity in the home they had shared.

A source close to the Haynes side of the family tells of more horrors: that Lisi beat all of the women in his family, including his elderly mother-in-law.

When Lisi died, the source said, one of Lisi’s daughters responded, “I’m glad, Mommy. He was bad.”

Haynes, high-strung and ill, was so racked with despair over what she believed was happening to her grandchildren that she temporarily lost control, friends said.

That picture contrasts with the one painted by police, prosecutors and friends of the dead man.

Lisi, his friends said, was a doting father who would do anything for his daughters. He was a yeller, they said, but he never hit anyone and he never lost control of himself. Friends reported that the molestation accusations weren’t the only nasty things to happen to the Disney executive. As relations between the couple grew more strained, the friend said, Lisi was the victim of dirty tricks--like the time a container of ice was poured over the top of the shower while he was inside bathing.

“It got to the point where he couldn’t even take a shower in his own home,” the friend said.

Lawyer Suzanne Harris, who represented Pamela Lisi in her divorce, said she believed the molestation allegations were true.

“Ken was not right ,” Harris said. “He would go out talking to his lawyer . . . and stand and pound on the wall. You could see his fury. I thought he was crazy.”

But when custody was decided in August of 1993, Kenneth Lisi won the prize: The girls were sent temporarily to live with him.

Initially, he was not required to allow the mother to visit, according to court documents, although the judge strongly encouraged him to do so.

Some of the record has been sealed, but it appears that the decision was based in part on the recommendation of a court-appointed attorney for the girls.

Before the killing, Lisi, who wrote and produced much of the music used in Disney theme parks and whose voice is heard at some of the attractions, bought a house in Lancaster. He was engaged to be married, and friends said he hoped to give the daughters a warm, churchgoing atmosphere in which to live.

The night he was killed, according to Lisi’s friends, he had planned to show the girls the new house and take them trick-or-treating in their new neighborhood.

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That night, according to court documents, investigators and the defendant’s own statement to police, Haynes phoned Lisi and asked him to come to the house in Northridge. Pamela Lisi’s car had broken down, she allegedly told him, so Lisi needed to come pick up the girls, who had been spending the weekend with their mother.

So with his friends waiting for the party meant to celebrate the move to the new house, Lisi set off for his former home. His parents, Ernest and Faye Lisi, followed in their car to head off any trouble.

When the three arrived, according to Lisi’s father’s testimony at the preliminary hearing, Lisi got out and knocked on the door. There was no answer. He knocked again and stepped back onto the concrete path leading up to the house.

Haynes, then 73 years old and suffering from diabetes, chronic bursitis and high blood pressure, came out shooting, Ernest Lisi testified.

“The worst part of it all is that we were there and we weren’t able to save him,” Faye Lisi said in an interview. “We saw our son being murdered.”

At the time of the killing, the two Lisi children were with their mother on the Westside of Los Angeles. Their mother later checked them into a hotel under assumed names, according to court documents.

Haynes, in her initial statement to police, said that she believed her daughter had not intended to return them that night.

Haynes’ attorney, Deputy Public Defender Michael Duffey, declined to comment. Pamela Lisi did not respond to a request for an interview made to her attorney, Seth Kramer. Pamela Lisi recently attempted to replace Duffey with private attorneys, but two judges have refused to permit the change.

The prosecution did offer the elderly Haynes a plea bargain that would have required her to plead guilty to second degree murder, according to a source close to the case. She rejected it because of the 15-years-to-life penalty.

A friend tells of an eerie coincidence: The weekend of the killing, Lisi, weary of the charges and countercharges, confided that he didn’t think he would see his children again.

“You don’t understand them,” the friend claims Lisi said shortly before the shooting. “I can’t win. They’re not going to be happy until I’m dead.”