from www.monrovia.patch.com – The first officer on the scene the day Felicia Lee died testified Monday in the trial of Brian Lee Randone, who is accused of murdering and torturing the former adult film actress.
The man accused of murdering and torturing former adult film star Felicia Lee in Monrovia in 2009 broke down and cried after paramedics declared the woman dead, a Monrovia Police officer testified Monday.
Monrovia Police Officer Thomas Montes, the first person to arrive at an apartment in the 500 block of West Duarte Road after authorities received a frantic emergency call the afternoon of Sept. 11, 2009, took the stand Monday in the murder and torture trial of Brian Lee Randone.
Randone, who is charged with murder and torture for allegedly smothering Lee to death, broke down in tears after paramedics could not revive her, according to Montes.
“Is there anything you guys can do, can’t you guys do anything,” Randone said, according to Montes, before hanging his head and crying.
Montes said that when he arrived at Randone’s apartment at about 12:15 p.m. on Sept. 11, 2009, the front door was locked. Firefighters were retrieving equipment to force the door open when Randone appeared at the door and said he’d been delayed because he was attempting to perform CPR on Lee. A paramedic testified last week that Lee’s body did not appear as if someone had performed CPR on her when she was found dead by authorities.
Though Montes spoke with Randone and stayed at the crime scene for more than 10 hours the day of Lee’s death, he could not identify Randone in court Monday.
Wearing a gray suit and dull yellow shirt in court with closely cropped gray hair around his bald head, Randone looks strikingly different than the booking photo taken by the sheriff’s department in 2009. In that photo, Randone’s head is completely shaved and he had a patch of facial hair under his lower lip.
Asked if he saw Randone in the court room Monday, Montes replied, “No, I do not.”
The medical examiner who performed Lee’s autopsy ruled her death a homicide by suffocation. Randone’s attorneys have argued that Lee died of an overdose of the drug GHB, commonly referred to as the date rape drug.
A recreational user of the drug, Lee had a high level of GHB in her system at the time of her death, a coroner’s official said. Dr. Cyrus Rangan, the director of the Los Angeles County Department of Health’s Bureau of Toxicology, finished his testimony Monday and again insisted that Lee’s GHB level was not proof that she died of an overdose.
Every person has a different tolerance for GHB, and though the high level in Lee could cause death in some people, it would only sedate others, Rangan has testified.
“Quantitatively, every single person is different,” Rangan said Monday. “The drug level itself is not what you can use to determine lethality.”
Prosecutor Philip Wojdak called his final witness Monday, briefly questioning Sheriff’s Homicide Detective Brian Schoonmaker, who investigated Lee’s death. Schoonmaker’s testimony will resume Tuesday before Randone’s attorneys present their case for the first time.