Opinion ID: 2590211
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Murder and Mayhem of Geoffrey Alan Nelson

Text: On the night of Friday, February 11, 1983, between 11:00 and 11:30 p.m., Bryce Wilson saw Geoffrey Alan Nelson and Rodger James DeVaul, Jr. outside Wilson's home in Cypress, Orange County. When Wilson last saw the two, DeVaul was wearing Nelson's jacket. Neither Nelson nor DeVaul had consumed alcohol or drugs before leaving Wilson. About 1:30 a.m. on February 12, 1983, Nelson appeared at Wilson's front door and asked Wilson's mother, Sharon House, if he could speak with Wilson. She was unable to awaken Wilson, however, and Nelson left without speaking to him. About 5:15 that morning, Officer Donald Batchelder of the Los Angeles Police Department, who was off duty and driving to work, discovered Nelson's nude body on the Euclid Street on-ramp to the Garden Grove Freeway in the City of Garden Grove. As Batchelder got out of his car, he saw Nelson's foot move slightly. Batchelder got back into his car, drove to a telephone and called the local police. Officer Richard Morales of the Garden Grove Police Department responded to the scene and found the body warm to the touch, although he detected no pulse or respiration. Skid marks on the pavement indicated Nelson's body had been dumped from a moving vehicle. The front of Nelson's neck bore ligature marks, and he had been emasculated. Dr. Fischer performed the autopsy. After reviewing autopsy photographs and Fischer's notes and preliminary hearing testimony, Dr. Richards concluded Nelson had died as a result of ligature strangulation. There was a ligature mark on the neck consistent with a belt buckle. Nelson's right wrist also bore a ligature mark. Dr. Richards found that Nelson's penis and scrotum had been cut off by some type of sharp-edged instrument. Because the bleeding was not that great, Richards thought Nelson was probably dead when the injury was inflicted, although the emasculation could have occurred perimortem, or around the time of death. Skid marks and road burns on the body reflected Nelson was dead at the time of those injuries. Toxicological analysis revealed Nelson's blood-alcohol level to be 0.14 percent at the time of death. Nelson's blood also contained the anti-anxiety drug diazepam, and his stomach contained propranolol, a cardiac drug available only by prescription. Toxicologist Kelly opined the combination of diazepam and alcohol would have very, very noticeably sedated Nelson and could have caused him to fall asleep. Criminalist James White of the Orange County Sheriffs Department compared a fiber found on Nelson's body with the maroon socks of victim Eric Herbert Church, whose body had been found on January 27, 1983. White had only a single fiber and could compare only a longitudinal microscopic view; on that basis he concluded the fibers were consistent in color and diameter. The defense presented evidence that on February 11, 1983, one of Nelson's friends saw him drinking beer and taking Valium tablets. A friend of defendant's testified defendant had played bridge from about 7:00 p.m. to midnight on February 11, 1983. The next day, defendant worked from 9:00 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. as a computer programmer, on an assignment at St. Ives Laboratory in Palos Verdes. According to a coworker who was also at St. Ives that day, defendant appeared normal, not disheveled or injured, when he arrived for work. The defense also presented testimony by a female impersonator who worked in a gay bar and who believed a photograph of Nelson depicted a man the witness had met in a bar and with whom he had had a sexual relationship. Detective Shave, however, testified the witness's identification of Nelson as that man was mistaken. At the time of his death, Nelson, a single White male, was 18 years old. He stood five feet nine inches tall and weighed 129 pounds.