Olga Rutterschmidt: The Black Widow Murders

Olga Rutterschmidt: Gangster Granny 

On April 18, 2008, Helen Golay 78, formerly of Santa Monica, California, and Olga Rutterschmidt 75, formerly of Hollywood, California, were convicted of the murders of two homeless men—Paul Vados in 1999 and Kenneth McDavid in 2005. According to reports, Golay and Rutterschmidt staged Vados and McDavid's deaths to appear as hit and run incidents in order to collect on multimillion dollar life insurance policies they had taken out on the men. See Wikipedia full article here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Widow_Murders

Dubbed “The Black Widow Murders”, both women were charged with murder, and both are serving life sentences without the possibility of parole. "The Black Widow Murders" are featured on episode of American Greed on CNBC. On September 10, 2009, the case was profiled on an episode of Deadly Women entitled "Behind the Mask". On November 13, 2013, "Elder Skelter" featured a story about Ken McDavid's death. The episode was called "Death, Lies and Security Tap".

My own involvement with Olga Rutterschmidt is somewhat more personal. You see, I was her Bunkie at the Central California Women’s Facility in Chowchilla, California. Yes, that’s right- I slept above Olga.

How to begin describing her personality…? You might read about her and think she’s simply a deranged old lady, but I’m here to tell you that even at 81 (her current age)- she’s as sharp as a tack. She’s also quite a handful for everyone who needs to deal with her, but her age doesn’t slow her down, mentally or physically.

My first introduction to Olga came while I was out on “the yard” walking laps with a friend. We noticed an old lady sporting running shoes (that didn’t match) who was in the exercise area doing leg lifts. We continued to watch, thinking she looked somewhat comical, when all of a sudden she started doing men’s style crunches on a plank! Next, she pulled herself up on a chin up bar and held her full weight for about a minute! We sat there with our jars dropped to our waists. It was incredible, and being involved with sports my entire life, I had to meet this tiny dynamo I had heard so much about. She is rather infamous at Chowchilla.

As we walked up to her, we couldn’t help to notice the bright fuchsia pink lipstick she was wearing, nor could we miss the matching shade liberally applied to her cheeks. She’s definitely a fan of a multi-tasking make up- whether the shade is right or not. Appearances aside, the first thing you notice about Olga is her accent. She hails from Hungary (as did Zsa Zsa Gabor), and her speech is inflected often with “…darling this or darling that”. There’s also a deeply developed cynicism that one can’t help to notice. She told me she’d developed that while incarcerated, and I tend to believe that’s true. She was, and is, a broken woman.

That meeting led to a daily exchange of “hellos”, and eventually we sat down and she shared part of her story. I will be writing about that in my upcoming posts, as well as giving personal information from Olga herself that she would like the public to hear. You see, she has no one, so I am her liaison. Lucky me.

I hope you find my stories entertaining, and should you care to contact Olga, please email me and I’ll furnish you with that info.

I’ll be covering several notorious women in these segments, including Diane Downs and Jennifer Henderson (Deleon).

Behind Bars: The truth about life without the possibility of parole

What if you could help provide hope to the life of a person who has none? 

This is a new blog, but one that I hold very dear to my heart. In part, for personal reasons, but mainly to offer the public a glimpse at what is really going on. The contents of this blog may contain factual information that some may find offensive. In no way is it meant to, but sometimes the truth is a bitter pill to swallow. 

There are a group of women that have in the past behaved very badly. So badly, they are now safely ensconced behind triple layer fences topped with electrified razor wire. They are a select group of women who broke the law, committed, or were a party to a murder(s). For their crimes, it was decided by the courts, either by trial or plea bargain, that they would serve a life sentence without the possibility of parole for their crime. In other words, their chances of being released at this point in time, are zero.

Now you might be wondering why on earth ANYONE would want to listen to anything that might benefit these women. Why would anyone choose to hep? My intentions here are not to persuade you to think these women are victims of circumstance, nor are they victims of society. Most, if not all, are most likely guilty of their crimes. Many of these women have been serving their life sentences at one of two state prisons in California: Central California Women's Facility and California Institute for Women. I will begin my focus on the former prison, hereby known as "CCWF". 

My knowledge of these women stems from a former high school friend, Michelle Rene Scott, who committed her first and only crime, a double homicide 24 years ago. She was 26 at the time. That event resulted in the deaths of two persons, a man (her former boyfriend), and his current girlfriend. Both were shot at close range and died as the result. I will write another blog detailing the event more, but today my focus is meant to be on the women, not one woman in particular, who face the sentence of life without the possibility of parole.

CCWF houses many women facing life sentences. The numbers are staggering, however, the number of women facing life without the possibility of parole (now called "LWOP"), is about 88. The amount of time these women have served ranges from 30+ years down to less than 1 year for the new comers, who arrive all the time. In Michelle Scott's case, she has been incarcerated for 24 years now.

The current laws regarding the possibility for parole eligibility for non-LWOP's have changed dramatically. It used to be highly unlikely that the parole board would grant parole to a inmate serving a life sentence. Special circumstances were needed, along with a "perfect inmate record". That in itself is not always easy to maintain after 30 some years. Still, occasionally they were released. Now, as of today's date, the number of women being released is huge. They are also likely to have committed a murder, mayhem, great bodily injury, kidnapping, robbery, etc...however, their sentence was deemed appropriate for the possibility of parole, of which, they are likely to get granted after serving a percentage of their time.

So what is the point I'm trying to make? It's simply this: inmates serving a life sentence are being released every day whether or not you have any knowledge or input regarding the matter. Some of these inmates may rightly deserve to be released, others in my opinion, should not be, but will be.

Inmates serving a sentence of life without the possibility of parole do not have a chance to go home. Some of these inmates have worked very hard to be rehabilitated and make the most of their time. Many have served 20-30 years of their sentences. I believe that these women deserve the same consideration as the ones that are only facing a life sentence, and these considerations certainly should be on an individual basis.

My goal here is to educate the public on the facts- not attempt to sway you. You be the judge. These women have nothing to lose.

You may be wondering where I get my information. The answer to that is: I was once a prisoner along side these women. I met them, got to know them, and witnessed the hard work they have accomplished. They do this knowing they will not go home- they just want to turn their lives around.

I encourage all feedback and I am always happy to answer any questions. Thank you for taking the time to view this blog.