Some Murder Cases Get Away . . . and Some Are ‘Special’

When I saw the happy face of young Earl Rhoney this week, released from jail after prosecutors had to give up on murder charges against him, I thought of another happy occasion, with lots of other smiling faces.

It was a dinner I’d attended for the Irvine Police Department 18 months ago. Rhoney had just been convicted of first degree murder in the Jan. 20, 1994, bludgeoning death of Patricia Lea Pratt at her home in the Turtle Rock section of Irvine. The police brass that night were in part lauding those who had worked so hard to help bring about Rhoney’s guilty verdict. One of them, private dog trainer Larry Harris, even received a $10,000 check from AirTouch Cellular, where Pratt had worked, for cracking the case.

None of those people are smiling now.

The facts of the case are these: Pratt, 46, had apparently gone for a walk in the early evening after her husband had left for a meeting. She returned home and surprised a burglar who turned on her and killed her. Several items were missing from the house.

Murder is not a common occurrence in Irvine, voted annually among the safest cities in the U.S. This was only its fourth murder in four years. So you can imagine the police threw much of their resources at finding her killer.

It paid off. The police came up with a couple of witnesses who said Rhoney approached them and asked if they would participate in a burglary with him--the very day Pratt was killed. Soon after that Rhoney was arrested and sent to Juvenile Hall on charges related to another burglary, two weeks before, in that same neighborhood.

Now comes Larry Harris, whose trained dogs have been used by numerous police departments. Harris helped invent a machine that could vacuum up very tiny human particles left on clothing. In effect, the killer’s scent was left on the sweatshirt Pratt had been wearing.

Harris and his dog Duchess joined the police in surveillance on Rhoney after he was released from Juvenile Hall on Oct. 21, 1994. Duchess, police contend, was able to track down Rhoney on her own by first smelling the scent left on Pratt’s sweatshirt.

The jury accepted Harris as credible. Unfortunately for the Irvine police and Deputy Dist. Atty. Debbie Lloyd, the judge did not. Superior Court Judge Anthony J. Rackauckas took the rare step of overturning the jury’s verdict. Rackauckas, who, coincidentally, takes over the district attorney’s office on Jan. 1, 1999, said he wondered whether the dog had led Harris, or Harris had led the dog. Prosecutor Lloyd had to decide whether to prosecute Rhoney again, without the dog evidence.

But it came to a close this week. Superior Court Judge John J. Ryan, on the eve of a new trial, also barred Harris’s testimony, but for different reasons. He found the evidence the dog sniffed had been tainted through the storage process. Lloyd had some other evidence--carpet fibers found in Rhoney’s things were consistent with carpet from the Pratt home. But Lloyd finally decided she just didn’t have enough for a jury without Harris and Duchess.

This week I tracked down the lead Rhoney investigator, Larry Montgomery, who was in court on another matter. Montgomery was among those euphoric at the police dinner I mentioned. I well recall Irvine Police Chief Charles Brobeck telling everyone at that dinner how hard Montgomery had worked, nearly around the clock, pursuing Pratt’s killer.

I wanted to ask Montgomery whether the Rhoney case would become inactive, one of those not pursued unless someone comes forward out of the blue with a new lead.

He declined to discuss the case in detail because it’s still pending. But Montgomery did talk in general about old cases in which he and his colleagues have invested so much effort.

“We never give up,” he said. “You never know when you will get that lucky break, and we don’t just sit back and wait for it to happen. We still work these cases.”

One reason old cases can’t be forgotten, Montgomery said, is that you never know what technological advances will come along to help you: “We didn’t have four years ago [when Pratt was murdered] what we have today. And who knows what we’ll have two years from now that we can apply to cases we’re working.”

Montgomery did agree that the Pratt murder carries much meaning to those who worked it.

“This was a case where the victim was just minding her own business, completely innocent,” he said.

And yes, he said, in those kinds of cases, “you do develop an emotional attachment that perhaps adds an intensity to your efforts. You try to do your best in all your cases. But I admit it, this one is special.”

Rhoney, who says he wants out of California as fast as possible, surely knows that this one isn’t going to be shelved away in some file for old, inactive cases. My guess is Rhoney’s going to see the inside of a courtroom again some day.

Jerry Hicks’ column appears Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. Readers may reach Hicks by calling the Times Orange County Edition at (714) 966-7823 or by fax to (714) 966-7711, or e-mail to jerry.hicks@latimes.com