One Year Later, Strange Slaying Still Unsolved : Inquiry: Whoever killed Arlene Hoffman with a hunting-type arrow left few clues. The Laguna Niguel widow was a longtime political aide and moved in high-profile circles.

Portions of drywall were hacked away from her condo in a futile hunt for clues. Detectives asked childhood friends and family to undergo fingerprinting and lie detector tests to narrow the field of suspects. Her son even offered a $25,000 reward from his inheritance for details leading to the conviction of the killer.

But, one year later, the mystery remains unsolved as to who fired a hunting-type arrow through the chest of Arlene Hoffman, leaving her to bleed to death on the marble floor of her Laguna Niguel foyer.

Hoffman, 57, widowed nine months earlier, was long active in the backfield of Southern California political campaigns. Shortly before she was found slain Dec. 30, 1994, she had been hired as personal secretary to Jim Silva, newly elected to the Orange County Board of Supervisors.

“Because there are so many avenues to approach in this murder, we haven’t ruled anything out,” said Lt. Ron Wilkerson, spokesman for the Orange County Sheriff’s Department. “It doesn’t appear that robbery is the motive; there doesn’t appear to be anything to substantiate that. The place wasn’t ransacked.”

Simply put, there was little if any physical evidence at the scene to trace back to Hoffman’s killer--no shell casings or fingerprints, no permits or licensing required to buy or use an arrow, no weapon left behind.

Whatever was found during nearly two months of scouring her townhome was sealed from public view last year by a judge at the request of the Sheriff’s Department.

*

In her lifetime, Hoffman moved in some high-profile circles. In the 1970s, she was connected to some of the major stories and players of the day.

She worked for the late millionaire industrialist and world-class art collector Norton Simon, up to and including his failed campaign for U.S. Senate in 1970. She was involved in other political campaigns, including former Assembly Speaker Jesse M. Unruh’s unsuccessful 1973 bid to become mayor of Los Angeles. She was secretary to Fred Harber, a political consultant who vanished at sea off the coast of Baja California in June 1974.

In 1976, she was called to testify as a witness before the Orange County Grand Jury investigating political corruption.

Hoffman told the grand jury she was an employee of the hospital run by Dr. Louis Cella, a political kingmaker and largest campaign contributor in California at the time. Now dead, Cella was accused of billing Medi-Cal for nonexistent patients, then funneling the money into the campaigns of numerous candidates who went on to hold major office. He ultimately was convicted of income-tax evasion, Medicare and Medi-Cal fraud, embezzlement and conspiracy. He spent 31 months in federal prison.

Investigators believed Hoffman was on the payroll of a state-funded hospital but was actually working on political projects at Cella’s behest--such as mimeographing campaign hit mailers out of the hospital’s print shop. District attorney investigators say now that they believe she lied to protect her employers. Cella ran the first campaign of former Orange County Treasurer-Tax Collector Robert L. Citron, who has pleaded guilty for his role in the county’s bankruptcy.

Because Hoffman’s slaying occurred in the high-anxiety days after the nation’s largest municipal bankruptcy, the case has seemed ripe for speculation about a political connection. But beyond smoky rumor, investigators say, no such link between Hoffman’s death and the bankruptcy has crystallized.

*

By nightfall on Dec. 30, 1994, there was no call from Hoffman’s cellular phone, no sign of her Mercedes-Benz in the county government parking lot. Supervisor Silva, whose entire family had become quite fond of Hoffman, grew worried and personally called Sheriff Brad Gates to have deputies check his secretary’s condo. They found her dead in her hallway, the victim of an arrow possibly fired from a crossbow. An autopsy placed her death sometime during a 12-hour period between 7:30 p.m. Dec. 29 and 7:30 the following morning.

Detectives have not recovered the arrow--which might have passed through her body or been removed from it by the killer. Her dog was skittering around the entryway, its bark surgically squelched by a previous owner. The front door was unlocked and there was no sign of a break-in.

Inside her garage was her Mercedes and her cellular phone. Nothing of any value appeared missing from the house. Partial fingerprints taken from a stairway from which investigators suspect the killer fired the arrow down on Hoffman didn’t lead to an arrest.

Archery shops and sporting good stores in the region were questioned for leads.

“They’ve interviewed everyone who ever had contact with her or might have had contact with her,” Wilkerson said, “and any place she might have frequented, employees.”

Her relatives declined to discuss the case, requesting privacy in their grief. Her son, Charles Anthony Hoffman, 26, who was talkative July 12, 1994, when he announced the reward for information leading to the conviction of his mother’s killer, did not return phone calls.

In August, Hoffman’s estate was settled in Probate Court according to the wishes she outlined in her April 1994 will: Her son would inherit all personal possessions, such as her car and furnishings, plus 80% of her estate, valued at more than $300,000. Her sister’s two sons would inherit the remaining 20%.

No creditors emerged, court records show. There were not even any claims stemming from the personal bankruptcy she and her late husband, Joel, filed and had resolved two weeks before his death in March 1994 after battling cancer.

Hoffman leased her condo from her sister and brother-in-law, Joanne and John Dougherty, who friends say wanted her close to them in Dana Point.

The condo was sealed off for several months during evidence gathering. Then came cleanup and repairs totaling $12,000 from damage caused by the slaying and police investigation.

Wilkerson said Hoffman’s son eventually made the condo his home--at least for several months after that.

At the time he offered the $25,000 reward, Charles Hoffman said he hoped it would lead to an arrest and some “closure” for his family, which had suffered two deaths within a year.

In the year since her death, though, there has been no closure.

The Sheriff’s Department has not received any calls responding to the reward, Wilkerson said, and they have no fresh clues.

The family still grieves.

And everyone still wonders why someone would kill Arlene Hoffman.

Anyone with information related to the case is asked to call police, (714) 647-7042.