Juliana Redding found dark side of Hollywood dream

[RaVen Blackehart]

Juliana Redding was 21, an aspiring actress and model who, like so many others before her, had moved from Arizona to southern California in pursuit of the Hollywood dream. She wound up the victim in a real life murder mystery -- one few people are willing to talk about in any detail.
Juliana Redding, an aspiring model and actress, was found murdered in her Santa Monica apartment.

Juliana Redding, an aspiring model and actress, was found murdered in her Santa Monica apartment.

By the age of 18, Redding had earned her first film credit, appearing in a 2005 independent film called "Kathy T Gives Good Hoover," about college students and the graffiti culture.

In 2006, she moved into a one-bedroom apartment in Santa Monica, California, with her pet Yorkshire terrier.

She was also taking college courses while working part-time in a trendy Venice Beach bar.

Friends grew worried in March when they couldn't reach Redding for a few days. They called her mother in Redding's hometown of Tucson, Arizona. Her mother called the Santa Monica police.

Police found Redding dead inside her apartment. "The manner of death is homicide," said Sgt. Rinaldi Thruston of the Santa Monica Police Department.

Although there are unconfirmed reports that the cause of death was blunt force trauma, the Los Angeles County Coroner's Office denies that. "Those media reports are not accurate. The cause of death was not blunt force trauma. The file has been sealed by police, so we cannot disclose the actual cause of death."
Police also would not disclose whether a weapon was used or whether Redding's apartment had been broken into, which would give clues as to whether she knew her assailant and opened the door for him or her.

Thruston also refused to say whether Redding had been sexually assaulted.

"We have made no arrests in this case nor do we have any suspects or persons of interest at this time," Thruston said.

He said police have collected evidence from the crime scene that could link a potential suspect to the crime. Police are hoping they will continue to get tips and leads from the public.

According to friends, Redding had been dating another actor for two years and they had broken up about six months before her slaying, but remained friends.

It is unclear whether she had a new boyfriend, but police have been interviewing all of Redding's known friends and neighbors.

"We believe the police are doing what they can to solve this case, but we really prefer no media attention," her mother said.

Early in the investigation, there were reports of blood found on the sidewalk or wall outside Redding's apartment.

continued

http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/02/17/...ing/index.html

[evervigilant]

She was beautiful . Very sad for her family .

[~Absynthe~]

She was beautiful . Very sad for her family .

[Shizz]

Hope this gets solved and proper justice finds the perp.

[Pete Bondurant]

This is horrible. She was pretty. Why can't only the ugly people die?

[SoUncool]

I read this yesterday on CNN. I wanna know why the police aren't giving out any info. Was it a cop? I mean why aren't they publicizing this case to get it solved? Seems very odd to me.

[Kufismacka]

CNN) -- A man and woman have been arrested for the 2008 killing of an aspiring actress and model, police in Santa Monica, California, said Monday.

Kelly Soo Park, 44, and Ronnie Wayne Case, 34, were charged with murder and conspiracy, according to the Santa Monica police department. The suspects, who live in Camarillo, California, are not eligible for bail, police said.

The victim, Juliana Redding, 21, had moved from Arizona to Los Angeles to pursue the Hollywood dream.

Her body was found in her apartment on March 16, 2008, police said. Authorities would not disclose the cause of death.

Sgt. Jay Trisler of the Santa Monica police told CNN the case is not closed...

Anyone with information on the homicide or has had any relationship with the suspects is asked to call the police at 310-458-8488.

i remember this case (sad) & not just b/c the vic. was extremely hot.

http://us.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/06/21/c...sts/index.html

[Dakota Valkyrie]

[...]
The Santa Monica Police Department is releasing limited information about the killing and the arrest because it is still under investigation and more arrests could follow, said Sgt. Jay Trisler. No cause of death has been released.

On Saturday, Park’s sister, Kim Park, was at Case’s home on Regent Street. Speaking through the white metal screen door of the home, Kim Park said the arrests came as a shock and have been horrifying.

“It was a false arrest, and we’re doing what we can to get them out,” she said.
[...]

Trisler said Case and Park are being charged with murder with special circumstances and conspiracy. The “special circumstances” is premeditation.
[...]

Known as “Ronnie the Rocket” Case, the 6-foot-tall, 200-pound racer often races at the Ventura Raceway. He’s currently ranked 13th in points; his last race there was June 5.

A sponsor of Case’s orange, number 8 car is Sherwood Financial & Investments. Kelly S. Park is an agent with the company, based in Thousand Oaks. Her sister said she is a mortgage broker.

“For this to happen is so out of context for Ronnie or Kelly,” Kim Park said. “It’s horrifying for us.”
[...]

Case has been accused of violence before.

In April, a Ventura County Superior Court judge dismissed sexual assault charges against Case after the prosecutor determined it could not prove the case beyond a reasonable doubt.

He had been accused of assaulting a 17-year-old girl at his home in 2006 while she was there with friends.

Case had been charged with several felonies, including forcible rape and sodomy by use of force. He pled not guilty.

When he was charged in 2008, prosecutors said he used his house for parties with a group that follows him around during racing events and had a stripper’s pole where he would have women undress while he videotaped them.

Kelly Park’s only county court records involve bail forfeiture for two traffic-related incidents.

http://www.vcstar.com/news/2010/jun/...uple-in-santa/

[Dakota Valkyrie]

Hmmm... I wonder what's up.

Los Angeles County prosecutors have decided not to pursue charges against a Camarillo race car driver in the 2008 killing of a Santa Monica woman.

Prosecutors sent the case involving Ronnie Wayne Case, 34, back to the Santa Monica Police Department for more investigation, Shiara Davila-Morales, a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office, said Monday afternoon.
[...]

Davila-Morales could not say why prosecutors dropped charges against Case. Case and Park were arrested in Camarillo around 1:40 p.m. Friday, Santa Monica police said.
[...]

Santa Monica police said they worked with Oxnard police, the Ventura County Combined Agencies Team and the FBI in the investigation leading to Park’s and Case’s arrest.

http://www.vcstar.com/news/2010/jun/...ce-car-driver/

Charges remain in place against Kelly Soo Park.

[Dakota Valkyrie]

A woman charged with the 2008 murder of an aspiring fashion model and actress whose body was found inside her Santa Monica apartment reportedly received hundreds of dollars from a business associate of the victim's father.

Investigators now believe the killing may have been a murder-for-hire plot.
[...]

Prosecutors claim Park was paid $250,000 three weeks before Redding's murder, and her family received another payment of $113,400 days before Park's arrest.

Prosecutors say the money came from Park's employer, Dr. Munir Uwaydah, who was involved in a failed business deal with the victim's father, Greg Redding.
[...]

The Santa Monica police say there's a possibility of additional arrests and the investigation continues.

http://www.ktla.com/news/landing/ktl...,7499161.story

[runecire]

So this poor girl was not directly involved in what transpired between the business partners? This seems the lowest of the low. To be a victim with no knowledge as to why your a victim. Holy Crap!

Rest in peace, Juliana. There will be justice for you some day...some how.

[Aena]

Wow she is beautiful. What a sad,tragic end to such a short life. Being killed over a failed business deal that her father was involved in is just crazy. Can you imagine how her father must feel, even though it isn't his fault he has to feel such guilt. I feel so bad for him. I hope the monster that took her life gets fried and I am a flip flopper on the death penalty, but damn to me, if she did it, this woman deserves it.

[akika666]

victim and alleged perp look strangely alike

[Dakota Valkyrie]

Suspect in aspiring model's murder was 'muscle' for doctor, D.A. says

New court documents released in a case involving the killing of an aspiring Santa Monica model detail several instances in which a doctor allegedly employed enforcers to ensure that he got his way.

In documents released earlier this month, attorneys prosecuting Kelly Soo Park in the 2008 killing of Juliana Redding, 21, say Park “has a history of threatening and intimidating individuals who have an ongoing dispute with” doctor and businessman Munir Uwaydah.

Though Uwaydah has not been charged, prosecutors said that on at least two other occasions, Park and her former boyfriend, Ronnie Case, worked as “muscles” for Uwaydah.

A transcript of grand jury proceedings previously reported by The Times alleged that Redding had been calling police for help when the killer snatched the phone from her hands and hung up. The newly released documents allege that Park stalked Redding in the days leading up to the slaying. The documents say DNA evidence was discovered on Redding’s neck and on the knob of a gas stove that was turned up in an attempt to blow up the apartment.

Though prosecutors have previously implicated Uwaydah in court hearings, the new documents more specifically detailed two additional incidents in which Park and her boyfriend served as the doctor’s “debt collectors.”

The Marina del Rey physician, prosecutors have said, had dated Redding and was close to launching a pharmaceutical business with Redding's father, who backed out of the deal days before the killing.

Prosecutors previously told The Times that the doctor had fled the United States the day Park was arrested. It was unclear Wednesday whether he had returned, but in the court documents prosecutors made clear “the People are not seeking to prove that the defendant murdered Ms. Redding at the direction of Dr. Uwaydah.” Rather, they continued, the intent was to “intimidate and threaten” Redding.

The newly released documents allege that Uwaydah had previously sent Park and her boyfriend to the home of another man to bully him into making payments on a $350,000 judgment in 2008. Two years later, around the time of Redding’s death, the documents allege that Park and her boyfriend were again instructed by Uwaydah to use intimidation tactics on a bank manager who had withdrawn from a business deal.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lano...-da-says-.html

Sitting on the specially secured 9th floor of the Los Angeles Criminal Courts building Park cuts a rather unusual figure for a defendant accused of murder. In Los Angeles County, most accused killers at pre-trial hearings are shackled in the iconic LA County "blues" or jail jumpsuits and led into court through jail holding cells by armed Sheriffs Deputies.

Not so for Park, who is out on $3.5 million dollars bail wearing a discreet electronic monitoring ankle bracelet. During the economic recession she cut a deal for considerably less than the standard 10 percent bond with Beverly Hills bail bondsman Josh Herman, who catered to rap-stars like Snoop Dogg and Tupak Shakur as past clients.

Out on bail, Park is free to roam the hallways at pre-trial hearings, where she sits comfortably dressed in understated but stylish civilian clothing with friends and supporters easily shifting between fluent English or Korean; even chatting with the gaggle of news media covering her case.

While Park respectfully declines to discuss the facts of her case, she expresses exasperation at the charges against her, or the indignity of the time she spent behind bars before Herman helped her post bail more than two years ago.

That's where, Park explains, she struck up a jailhouse friendship with another unlikely female murder suspect, decorated LAPD Detective Stephanie Lazarus - both of whom stood accused of killing other women.
[...]

Standing tall in the courtroom at 5'10", with fine features, long jet-black hair, and manicured nails - Park is educated, demure, coiffed, and stylish. So, it is decidedly incongruous to put her at the center of that disturbing crime scene in Juliana Redding's Santa Monica apartment.

"Beaten and strangled to death inside her apartment...Kelly Soo Park, used her bare hands to kill Redding as Redding fought for her life," prosecutor Alan Jackson told the grand jury two years ago.

A trial date remains nebulous as a remarkable revolving door of trial attorneys has cycled through the case since 2010. Another Deputy DA was recently assigned to take over the prosecution's case, and Park is on her third defense team.

Still no trial date set.

[Dakota Valkyrie]

Trial opens for 'female James Bond' in aspiring model's death

The opening day of the murder trial of a woman accused of strangling aspiring model and actress Juliana Redding focused on a doctor the victim once dated.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Stacy Okun-Wiese said Redding, 21, was killed by Kelly Soo Park, an associate of a doctor Redding once dated.

Redding was killed five days after her father broke off negotiations on a business deal with her ex-boyfriend, Dr. Munir Uwaydah, prosecutors said in opening statements, and Park’s DNA was discovered on the victim's neck and clothing and in her apartment.

The prosecutor said detectives were able to determine that DNA found on Redding's neck, her cellphone, a stove knob and blood from a fingerprint in the home all belonged to a female suspect.
[...]

Uwaydah has denied any involvement in Redding's death. Prosecutors previously said they suspected Uwaydah fled the country when Park, 47, was arrested in 2010. The doctor's attorney, Benjamin N. Gluck, declined to comment Wednesday.
[...]

Prosecutors have previously said that Uwaydah made six-figure payments to Park and her family before the killing and before Park's arrest. They said he also bragged that he had a "female James Bond" in Park.

Okun-Wiese did not mention the payments during her opening statements, but the doctor otherwise figured prominently in the first day of Park's trial.
[...]

Juliana Redding was found dead inside her small Centinela Avenue apartment, which smelled strongly of gas. Her stove had been left on and a candle was burning.

"Juliana Redding spent the last moments of her life literally fighting to save herself," prosecutors told the jury. "Juliana Redding tried to fight off a woman. A woman she did not know .... A woman who needs to be held accountable for her actions."

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/l...,4544908.story