Rathbun Didn’t Need a Model, Publisher Says : Crime: Magazine that hired suspect in Sobek slaying never uses photos that show people.

On the day he met model Linda Sobek for a photo shoot in the Angeles National Forest, Charles E. Rathbun was on an assignment for an auto magazine that does not use models in its photos, the magazine’s publisher said Tuesday.

The disclosure by Leon Mandel, publisher of AutoWeek, raises new questions about why the 38-year-old free-lance photographer was with Sobek before the former Raiders cheerleader was found slain in a remote area of the forest.

Last week, authorities say, Rathbun told them under questioning that he had taken Sobek to a dry lake bed so she could pose for photos with a soon-to-be-issued sport utility vehicle.

But in an interview Tuesday with The Times, Mandel said he did not know why the 27-year-old Hermosa Beach woman would have been brought along for the photo shoot. “We do not use models,” Mandel said. “We never use models.”

So what was Sobek doing with Rathbun?

“That,” the publisher said, “is not a question I am able to answer.”

Although authorities believe they have their own grim answer to that question, many other questions remained unresolved Tuesday as sheriff’s investigators pursued a homicide case that has captured attention as far away as London and produced hundreds of telephone tips and other clues that may--or may not--lead to new charges against Rathbun.

On Tuesday, law enforcement officials said they intend to talk to a former roommate of Rathbun who has reportedly said she was sexually assaulted by him. Without disclosing the nature or even the year of the alleged assault, authorities said her accusation would be pursued if there is sufficient evidence. It was unclear whether the woman reported the alleged incident to police at the time, but no charges ever were filed.

“She’s called in,” said Sheriff’s Lt. David Dietrich, “but we haven’t interviewed her yet.”

Only hours before her disappearance Nov. 16, Sobek had left a message on her home answering machine saying that she could not be reached because she had a photo shoot. As events unfolded, it became clear that the former Raiders cheerleader met with the free-lance photographer now charged with her murder.

Rathbun allegedly told investigators that while showing Sobek how to spin the vehicle in tight circles, he accidentally ran over her.

On Monday, Rathbun pleaded not guilty to a single count of first-degree murder. He was held on $1 million bail.

So far, authorities have downplayed speculation that the tall, blond photographer from Hollywood may be linked to other crimes, but they have acknowledged that they are investigating similarities between the disappearance of Sobek and that of another blond model, Kimberly Pandelios, in 1992. The body of the 20-year-old Northridge woman, who disappeared after telling acquaintances she was going on a photo shoot, was found in 1993 in the Angeles National Forest.

“Every day I think of my daughter,” Pandelios’ mother, Magaly Spector, told reporters Tuesday. “I believe there’s a connection between the two cases,” she said. “Someone just doesn’t go up there randomly. . . . She was led to the forest by someone who knew about modeling and photography.”

But Dietrich said investigators do not know if Pandelios’ death is related to Sobek’s slaying. “At this point we have no indication of a tie,” he said. “We don’t even know if he knew her.”

Dietrich said no photos of Pandelios were found in Rathbun’s apartment and noted that she and Sobek came from different backgrounds. “It could all be coincidence,” he said, adding that detectives are concentrating on the Sobek case and will investigate connections later.

Meantime, the Sheriff’s Department assigned an ever-growing number of homicide investigators--20 as of Tuesday--to follow leads in the Sobek case and inquiries from other police agencies that are pouring in to the department.

Since Sobek’s body was recovered Saturday from a shallow grave about 15 miles south of Palmdale, sheriff’s investigators said they have received more than 400 clues and tips that need to be examined. Authorities also were assembling evidence collected with at least two search warrants executed thus far. Dietrich said investigators had not yet recovered the photos taken by Rathbun the day Sobek died.

Thus far, one law enforcement source and the Sobek family attorney have said they were told the cause of death was asphyxiation. But the Los Angeles County coroner’s office has said only that a preliminary autopsy does not support Rathbun’s claim that he ran over Sobek with a vehicle.

The cause of death, the coroner’s office said Tuesday, will not be released for two weeks.

Authorities said tests have been conducted to determine if Sobek was sexually assaulted, but the results of the test samples, now with the sheriff’s crime lab, will not be known for several days.

And although another law enforcement source said bruises were found on Sobek’s body, even that information was viewed with caution. It remains unclear, the source said, whether the bruises were connected with her slaying.

The source said the bruises could have come from an unrelated mishap before her death or could have been caused by some trauma after she was buried in a shallow grave of rocks and dirt.

“We just don’t know yet,” the source said.

In Columbus, Ohio, where Rathbun was acquitted of rape in 1980, homicide Sgt. Wallace Rushin said Tuesday that the Police Department plans to review murders from the late 1970s to the early 1980s to determine whether there are any cases similar to Sobek’s.

At the sheriff’s information bureau in Los Angeles, Deputy Gabe Ramirez said the grim tale of Sobek’s disappearance and slaying has generated extraordinary interest from the news media--not only nationally, but internationally.

“How about London?” Ramirez said, when asked about the calls coming into the office.

Since late last week, he said, the department has been forced to bring in extra personnel to field around-the-clock calls tying up eight phone lines. “I couldn’t even begin to tell you the number of calls,” Ramirez said.

While the phones rang off the hook at sheriff’s headquarters, the man charged with Sobek’s killing remained under suicide watch in a one-person Downtown jail cell after attempting to kill himself last week with a jail-issued razor while in custody in Hermosa Beach.

Sheriff’s spokesman Ramirez said the suicide watch would remain in effect “as long as deemed necessary” to prevent Rathbun from injuring himself as he awaits his next court appearance Jan. 5.

Among Rathbun’s visitors Tuesday was his attorney Mark J. Werksman.

In a telephone interview, Werksman said he had not been aware that any former roommate of Rathbun’s had alleged an assault.

The attorney also said he could not directly respond to the magazine publisher’s statement that AutoWeek never used models.

“I don’t know what the significance of that is because Charles Rathbun is a free-lance photographer for different publications,” Werksman said.

He speculated that Rathbun could have brought Sobek to the session to shoot photos that would be sold to other publications.

And as homicide investigators continued to wade through evidence, one suggested it was only a matter of time before the weight of alleged evidence against Rathbun would prove overwhelming.

“I am sure we are going to punch a lot of holes in his . . . statement,” homicide investigator Nash Reyes said.

* Times staff writers Duke Helfand, Bob Pool, Eric Slater and Julie Tamaki and correspondent Greg Sowinski contributed to this story.