CALIFORNIA BRIEFING / SANTA ANA
A Long Beach man who was linked to the 1988 killing of a high school friend was indicted Thursday for allegedly torturing and murdering the victim and then setting the body on fire to destroy evidence, Orange County prosecutors said.
Paul Gentile Smith, 49, was indicted by the Orange County Grand Jury on one felony count of special-circumstance murder with torture and a sentencing enhancement for the personal use of a deadly weapon.
Prosecutors allege that Smith killed his longtime friend and marijuana dealer, Robert Haugen, 29, in the victim’s apartment in Sunset Beach on Oct. 24, 1988. Smith allegedly stabbed the victim 18 times, nearly decapitating him, and then set the victim’s body and apartment on fire.
-- Monte Morin
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