Rathbun to Stand Trial for Murder in Sobek Case

A Municipal Court judge ordered freelance photographer Charles Rathbun on Tuesday to stand trial in the murder and sexual assault of model Linda Sobek, citing evidence ranging from fingerprints on a daybook to Rathbun’s somber confession to a friend.

The ruling capped a two-day preliminary hearing in which prosecutors presented witnesses and evidence suggesting that Rathbun had long tried to conceal that he met the Hermosa Beach model, 24, for a photo shoot Nov. 16, the day she disappeared. Six days later, Rathbun, 38, of Hollywood, led detectives to her body in a shallow grave in the Angeles National Forest.

But even as Rathbun was ordered to remain in custody without bail in a case that could bring him the death penalty, his attorney noted that authorities have yet to present any physical evidence that Rathbun killed or even sexually assaulted the victim, who Rathbun says died as a result of a driving stunt that went awry.

Moreover, attorney Mark Werksman said that in the upcoming trial he intends to press his contention that authorities have presented no proof that whatever happened between Rathbun and Sobek before her death was not consensual. An autopsy indicated that the model, who had worked before with Rathbun, may have been intoxicated before dying.

During testimony Monday, Dr. James Ribe, a senior deputy coroner, said that Sobek’s death was caused by asphyxiation and that she was sodomized.

But under cross-examination Tuesday by Werksman, Ribe acknowledged that he could not determine precisely how Sobek was asphyxiated, or whether her sexual assault was the result of a rape or use of a foreign object.

The autopsy, the coroner said, also found evidence of a suicide attempt by Sobek--one that prosecutor Steve Kay said occurred when she was 17 and despondent over breaking up with a boyfriend.

Noting that her blood-alcohol content was 0.13%, above the legal limit for intoxication, Ribe also acknowledged that there was no way to determine whether she was forced to ingest alcohol.

That fact was among several that could play a key role in Rathbun’s trial, when his attorney expects to explore other theories on what happened during the photo shoot. “Obviously, issues of consent, issues of the relationship between Mr. Rathbun and Ms. Sobek will be relevant,” Werksman said.

“In order to convict Mr. Rathbun, they are going to have to show that he acted with premeditation, that his acts were deliberate, that they were knowing, that they were done intentionally. And they are going to have to show with respect to the sexual assault that any sexual conduct between them was non-consensual,” Werksman said.

“And they haven’t even shown [through physical evidence] that he was the person who perpetrated any of the injuries on the victim.”

Still, prosecutors Mary Jean Bowman and Kay presented other evidence that Judge Benjamin Aranda found more than ample to hold Rathbun for a trial that could begin in June.

Aranda cited Monday’s testimony that Rathbun led detectives to the grave site and other evidence suggesting that Rathbun attempted to hide the fact that he was with Sobek, then admitted that something had happened.

Two Sheriff’s Department criminalists testified that items recovered from a trash bin in the Angeles National Forest--among them, photos of Sobek and pages from her daybook--were found to have Rathbun’s fingerprints.

And in other testimony Tuesday, Shannon Meyer, a friend of Rathbun’s and a reserve sheriff’s deputy, recalled a telephone conversation with him Nov. 22, one day before Rathbun was arrested at his home.

“He asked me if I had heard about the missing model and I said, ‘No. . . .’ And he said, ‘Well, I know about the disappearance of that model Linda Sobek,’ ” Meyer testified.

“He said that he had hired her for a photography shoot and that he had . . . accidentally hit her” with a sport utility vehicle that he was planning to photograph, Meyer said.