Police Seek Husband in Slaying of His Wife

A woman was shot or beaten to death in her apartment building early Wednesday and police were searching for her husband who neighbors said rammed the woman’s car into the side of a building in a fit of anger last month.

Asher Portal, a 31-year-old Israeli immigrant, was being sought for questioning in the slaying of Shelly Portal, 30. Neighbors described the couple as having an abusive on-again, off-again relationship that often exploded into loud arguments in their second-floor apartment.

Building manager Samantha Barragan and her husband, Alfonso, found Shelly Portal’s body lying next to the second-floor elevator at 6:30 a.m. “She was already cold,” Alfonso Barragan said.

Neighbors said they heard what sounded like a gunshot around 6:10 a.m. However, LAPD Det. Stephen Fisk said the woman appeared to have died of “blunt force trauma.” Police have not identified a weapon used in the killing.

Barragan said neighbors had complained about the couple arguing and playing loud music for two weeks before Shelly Portal’s death. Neighbors described Asher Portal as a cleanshaven, heavyset man who stayed up most of the night and slept through the day. Police said he was an auto mechanic.

Barragan said the Portals had an unusually violent argument in front of the luxury apartment building about a month ago. Asher Portal finished the confrontation by taking his wife’s car and driving it into the side of the building and then driving off in it.

Fisk said Asher Portal has a history of domestic violence and was arrested Jan. 18 in connection with another argument with his wife.

“She refused to prosecute, so we didn’t file the case,” Fisk said. “She had a scratch on the neck, but she said she did it herself.”

Portal was also arrested last summer on suspicion of abusing a woman, whom law enforcement officials would not identify, drunk driving and drug possession.

City attorney’s office spokesman Jim Qualls said a security guard told police that Portal had struck a woman as they were sitting in a Tarzana parking lot. Police discovered he was intoxicated and arrested him, Qualls said, but the woman denied that Portal had beaten her.

“He’s got a really bad temper,” said property manager Marlena Reyes, who once confronted him over a rent dispute.

Neighbors described Shelly Portal, whose young son lives in San Diego with her first husband, as a friendly, attractive woman who loved her husband.

After Asher Portal heaped verbal abuse upon his wife and drove off in her car, Barragan, who occasionally acted as Shelly Portal’s confidante, offered her advice.

“I warned her,” she said. “I told her to leave him.”

Fisk, who was holding an El Al Israel Airlines travel itinerary retrieved from Portal’s apartment, said he feared Portal would leave the country.

“That certainly is a possibility,” he said. “All his family is in Israel. I think there’s a good chance he’ll try to flee if he’s involved.”