McDougal Insincere, Predecessor Testifies

As described by the witness for the prosecution, it was a scene worthy of an Aaron Spelling soap: Two women, rivals to the core, clasped hands and smiled as they said their goodbyes at the end of a posh $100,000 wedding at a Brentwood estate.

Although their hands were joined, their claws were bared.

The departing bride was Lorraine Kovach-Padden, a Princess Diana look-alike who is a cousin of Nancy Mehta. She lived with Mehta and her conductor husband, Zubin, for eight years before the Sept. 7, 1991, wedding, complete with velvet cushions for the guests, gazebo, koi ponds and strains of classical music played by some of the best musicians in the world. The other woman was Whitewater figure Susan McDougal, who had replaced Kovach-Padden as Nancy Mehta’s assistant and live-in sidekick.

Kovach-Padden recalled the exchange for jurors Monday at McDougal’s embezzlement trial in Santa Monica Superior Court: “With a smile on her face, she held my hands and she said through her smile, ‘Now, you’re never coming back to this house, are you?’ ”

Her response, Kovach-Padden said: “As long as you’re in this house, you have nothing to worry about.”

And so, the tone of the trial got down and dirty as prosecutor Jeffrey Semow began to present a parade of witnesses who he hopes will rebut portions of McDougal’s story.

McDougal has testified that Mehta gave her free rein over her credit cards and checkbook. Mehta denied it.

In its final days, the trial has started to resemble a cross between “Dynasty” and “Family Feud.”

Just as McDougal’s fiance, Pat Harris, testified on her behalf, now Zubin Mehta is scheduled to take the stand as early as this afternoon to defend the honor of his wife of 29 years.

Although McDougal, during her eight days on the stand, has portrayed Nancy Mehta as a lonely, erratic and controlling spendthrift, Semow told Superior Court Judge Leslie Light that the conductor will testify that his wife did not shop excessively, spent much of her time traveling with him and never argued about the money he spent on children he had with other women.

Kovach-Padden, who depended on the kindness of the Mehtas for her college and law school educations, not to mention the posh wedding, had testified earlier in the trial. She was called back to the stand as a rebuttal witness and immediately returned a volley of sharp digs at McDougal, who last week had described Kovach-Padden as a selfish ingrate.

She called McDougal “cold and insincere,” and said their dislike for each other was obvious from the beginning. She said McDougal was nice to her when Nancy Mehta was around, and not nice when Mehta was gone.

Kovach-Padden again insisted that Mehta never authorized her to sign checks or credit card receipts on her behalf, but revealed under questioning by defense attorney Mark Geragos that Nancy Mehta paid many of her expenses. And Geragos pointed out several occasions in which she had signed for Mehta, examples of a routine that closely resembled what McDougal and Mehta had done on shopping excursions.

McDougal is accused of bilking the Mehtas of about $150,000 between 1989 and 1992 by forging Nancy Mehta’s signature on checks and a credit card application.

But the nine-week trial long ago devolved into a soap opera that has focused on details of the Mehtas’ lavish lifestyle--ranging from feeding steaks to a borzoi to flying a plumber, his wife and an assistant from Los Angeles to Italy to fix the garden sprinklers at the summer villa.