Eddie Nash
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Eddie Nash (b. 1929) was a Palestinian nightclub and restaurant manager in Los Angeles, as well as a convicted gangster and drug dealer; he is best known for his involvement in the quadruple Wonderland Murders.
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[edit] Early life
Born Adel Gharib Nasrallah in Palestine, he said he left the country after Israeli soldiers gunned down his brother-in-law in the street for no reason and narrowly missed him. His family are Orthodox Christian Arabs from the Palestinian city of Ramallah just outside Jerusalem. In the nonfiction book by John Gilmore, "L.A. Despair: A Landscape of Crimes & Bad Times," Gilmore states that Nash told his lawyer that he had dreams filled with muzzle flashes and bullets soaring over his head. Eddie said he owned several hotels until 1948 at age 19. He emigrated to the United States in the early 1950s and developed a limp. Nash acted in the television series The Cisco Kid, in 1952 in "The Quarter Horse" episode as the character "Nash." He went on to own several nightclubs in Los Angeles, such as the Starwood Club and Soul'd Out in West Hollywood, the Odyssey disco in Beverly Hills, Paradise Ballroom, the Seven Seas, Ali Baba’s and The Kit Kat strip club. Nash's clubs met the needs of many groups, as he operated clubs marketed towards gays, straights, blacks, whites, and preppies.
For several decades, Adel Nasrallah was the wealthiest and most dangerous drug dealer and gangster operating on the West Coast (MacDonell 2003).
[edit] Wonderland Murders
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He is best known for his alleged involvement in the quadruple Wonderland Murders in 1981 which might have resulted from a robbery of Nash's home perpetrated two days earlier by three to five men. A key player in the incident was porn actor John C. Holmes, who was later tried for the murders and acquitted. Nash and Holmes were close friends; Nash enjoyed introducing his associates to Holmes, who was notorious for his recurring cinematic role of "Johnny Wadd".
However by 1981, Holmes' star had fallen and he became desperately addicted to freebasing cocaine. In order to settle a drug debt he owed to one of his drug connections, Ron Launius, leader of the widely feared Wonderland Gang which dominated the LA cocaine trade in 1981, he conspired to invade Nash's home and commit a robbery in which Nash and his bodyguard were brutalized and humiliated. Two days later Launius and three other people were found bludgeoned to death at their home at 8763 Wonderland Avenue in Laurel Canyon. Holmes was spared.
Murdered in the incident were Ron Launius, Billy Deverell, Joy Audrey Gold Miller, and Barbara Richardson. Critically injured was Susan Launius, Ron's wife. Officials from the LAPD remarked that the scene was bloodier than the Tate/LaBianca murders.
A police search of Nash's home days after the murders revealed a large amount of cocaine. Nash was sentenced to 8 years in prison, but a judge released him after 2 years, purportedly for health reasons. An associate of Nash's later admitted that they had bribed the judge with about $100,000. (Goldsmith 2001)
In 1990 Nash was tried in state court for having planned the murders; the trial resulted in an 11-1 hung jury; Nash would later admit that he had bribed the lone holdout, a young woman, with $50,000. The retrial ended in an acquittal.
Throughout the 1990s, law enforcement figures continued to hound Mr. Nash, who had been referred to as "the one who got away" (Citation: Various LA Times articles). In 1995, in a broad series of raids targeting alleged organized crime figures, federal agents armed with search warrants raided his house and confiscated what was thought to be a cache of methamphetamine. To the chagrin of law enforcement the "meth" turned out to be a cache of mothballs and no charges were filed against Nash.
In 2000, after a four-year joint investigation involving local and federal authorities, Nash was arrested and indicted on federal charges under the RICO act for running a drug dealing and money laundering operation, conspiring to carry out the Wonderland Murders, and bribing one of the jurors of his first trial. Nash, already in his seventies and suffering from emphysema and several other ailments, agreed to a plea bargain agreement in September 2001, pleading guilty to RICO charges and to money laundering. He also admitted to jury tampering (for which the statute of limitations had run out) and to having ordered his associates to retrieve stolen property from the Wonderland house, which might have resulted in violence including murder, but he denied having planned the murders that took place. He also agreed to cooperate with law enforcement authorities. He received a four and a half year prison sentence (including the time already served) and a $250,000 fine. (LAPD 2002)
Released in 2002 (MacDonell 2003), as of 2007 Eddie Nash is a free man and lives in Los Angeles.
[edit] Bautista murders
On September 6 or 7, 1984, a personal tragedy struck Mr. Nash. A former friend of his, Maureen Bautista and her son Telesforo were brutally murdered by stabbing. Hells Angels biker Robert Frederick Garceau was convicted of this murder and sentenced to death. Newspaper accounts of the crime mentioned that Telesforo was actually a son of Mr. Nash.
Garceau was turned in to the police after he murdered Greg Rambo, who had helped him dispose of the bodies of the Bautistas. Rambo's wife had knowledge of the Bautista murders and talked to the police (under an agreement of immunity). Garceau was convicted of all three murders.
At trial, evidence was presented that Garceau murdered Ms. Bautista because she threatened to expose Garceau's drug operations to Mr. Nash. Her son was murdered because he was a witness to her murder. A lengthy court appeal was launched to vacate Garceau's death penalty, but in 1993 the California Supreme Court upheld the legality of what became known as "The Nash testimony". Garceau died in prison of natural causes in 2005.
[edit] Movies and books
- The character Rahad Jackson (played by Alfred Molina) in the 1997 movie Boogie Nights is loosely based on Eddie Nash.
- The 2003 movie Wonderland in which Eric Bogosian played Eddie Nash revolves around the previously mentioned events.
- The 2003 book "Scary Monsters and Super Freaks" (ISBN 1560255633) by Mike Sager contains "The Devil and John Holmes," a chapter about Eddie Nash and the Wonderland Murders.
- The 2005 book "Long Time Money and Lots of Cocaine" by Rodger Jacobs contains a transcript of John Holmes' preliminary hearing in criminal court regarding the Wonderland murder case.
- Nash is featured prominently in the 2006 nonfiction book "Underworld Secrets" (ISBN 0932438474) written by Jerry Van Hoorelbeke, an associate of Nash in the late 1970s.
- "Bad Eddie & Other No Good People" is the nonfiction centerpiece of "L.A. Despair: A Landscape of Crimes & Bad Times" (ISBN 1878923161) by John Gilmore, spotlighting Eddie Nash, John Holmes, L.A.'s drug dealing and the porn business.
[edit] References
- Return to Wonderland, Salon.com, 9 June 2000
- Susan Goldsmith: "A Really Good Deal Ex-nightclub owner may serve only 37 months in Wonderland murders." New Times Los Angeles, 20 September 2001
- Joan Osterwalder: "Ex-Nightclub Owner Sentenced to Three Years in Prison", City News Service, 12 October 2001
- California Supreme Court Decision about the brutal murders of Maureen Bautista and Mr. Nash's reputed son. 18 November 1993
- Press release by the LAPD News about Nash's federal conviction, 13 February 2002
- Allan MacDonell: In Too Deep. LA Weekly, 2 October 2003
- John Gilmore: L.A. Despair: A Landscape of Crimes & Bad Times. The Wonderland Murder Crime Scenes [1]
