Blake Prosecution Witness Possibly Delusional, Expert Says

A drug expert testifying for the defense in the Robert Blake murder trial said Thursday that prolonged cocaine or methamphetamine use could spark delusions that alter the way users perceive events and their surroundings.

Ronald Keith Siegel, a psychopharmacologist and UCLA faculty member, told jurors that delusions brought on by heavy methamphetamine or cocaine use could be mistaken for the real thing.

With drugs like cocaine or methamphetamine, Siegel said, “Your mind, your thoughts, your fantasies ... can become projected out and turn into some visible events or some auditory events or some tactile events.”

Siegel, the author of two books on drug use who has been paid $11,000 as an expert for the defense, was one of several witnesses called in an attempt to discredit the prosecution’s star witnesses, stuntmen Gary McLarty and Ronald “Duffy” Hambleton.

Blake, 71, is accused of killing Bonny Lee Bakley, 44, on May 4, 2001, as she sat in the actor’s car about two blocks from a Studio City restaurant where they had just dined. Prosecutors argue that when Blake failed to persuade McLarty and Hambleton to kill Bakley, the actor fatally shot his wife himself.

The stuntmen testified last week that Blake asked them to kill his wife and laid out multiple scenarios for carrying out the killing, including one similar to the slaying.

But they also admitted to using cocaine and methamphetamine, a key point of attack by defense attorney M. Gerald Schwartzbach, who has argued the stuntmen’s memories of contacts with Blake are suspect.

To make the point, he called McLarty’s son and wife, Cole and Karen McLarty, who testified about a cocaine-fueled breakdown in which McLarty thought he saw police tunneling under his home and believed he was being watched by satellites. Two admitted drug users who frequented Hambleton’s Lucerne Valley ranch said Hambleton experienced delusions that included seeing a 4-foot horned animal in his yard, and hunting for intruders he believed were disguised as sagebrush and Joshua trees.

Though technical, Siegel’s testimony also had its unusual moments.

Describing his early career, Siegel said he identified the rock cocaine phenomenon a decade before it entered the American lexicon, and conducted an experiment in a UCLA basement with crack-smoking monkeys.

Asked whether seeing a horned animal was a typical delusion, Seigel said it was. He said others saw “dweeves,” mischievous creatures smaller than dwarfs who live under furniture and plot to disrupt a user’s family life.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Shellie Samuels has tried to counter the drug use allegations by presenting corroborating witnesses who also said Blake spoke of wanting to kill his wife. The stuntmen’s allegations have also been supported by receipts and phone records.

Samuels asked Seigel how an expert would sort out conflicting claims of drug users.

“My question to you is, if you have one drug user reporting behavior of another drug user, how do you know which drug user to believe?

“I am glad I am not sitting on the jury,” the professor responded. “They have to decide. I can’t.”