LOS ANGELES -- Without hearing Marvin Pancoast's tape recorded statements to police, a judge today ordered the him to stand trial for the slaying of Vicki Morgan, longtime mistress to Alfred Bloomingdale.
Municipal Court Judge James Satt ordered Pancoast held without bail pending an Aug. 12 Superior Court arraignment.
Following a 45-minute closed door hearing, Satt ruled that testimony by two police officers concerning taped statements Pancoast made shortly after the slaying could be read to reporters. The testimony had been made in a closed meeting with the judge and attorneys.
Detective William Welch testified that he was on his way out of the North Hollywood police station July 7 to go to Miss Morgan's apartment when he passed Pancoast, who was handcuffed to a bench in the hallway.
The detective said Pancoast blurted out, 'I did it, I did it, I hit Vicki.'
Deputy District Attorney Stanley Weisberg said the prosecution decided not to play Pancoast's taped statements in court because they felt they had presented sufficient evidence to have Pancoast stand trial.
Defense attorneys submitted an unsuccessful motion to dismiss murder charges against his client, saying the prosection had not presented one 'scintilla' of physical evidence to prove Pancoast had commited the murder.
Attorney Robert K. Steinberg had been subpoenaed by the defense to testify at the hearing, but was not called to the stand. He appeared in court Thursday but did not arrive Friday and the defense rested its case without his testimony.
Steinberg claimed he saw videotapes of Miss Morgan, Bloomingdale and government officials in sex acts, then later reported them stolen.
Pancoast's attorney, Arthur Barens, said his client was 'incompetent' when he made his statements to police and fought its admission as evidence, saying it could prevent his client from receiving a fair trial.
'Your honor, I submit that the only evidence that would suggest that my client is guilty of committing this crime is this alleged confession,' Barens said while arguing unsuccessfully to have the entire hearing closed.
'To allow that into the public eye now, I submit, he would be tried and convicted before we've ever put a defense on.'
Pancoast, 33, has pleaded innocent and innocent by reason of insanity to charges he beat Miss Morgan to death with a baseball bat in the North Hollywood apartment they shared.
Police Sgt. William Welch testified no fingerprints were found on the baseball bat and there was no physical evidence Pancoast was ever in the apartment.
The detective said the apartment was 'in a state of disarray' and it appeared someone was moving out. Police said the day of the murder that Miss Morgan had planned to move the next day because she could no longer afford the rent.
Welch said the apartment did not appear to be ransacked but when Barens showed him several police photographs of open drawers and bags, he conceded 'they could very well have been put in that position' if they had been ransacked.
'There was a ransacking there, there was a homicide there,' Barens said. 'It is as believable to me now that someone else did it as that Mr. Pancoast did it.'
Welch also testified he saw eight to 10 videocassettes in a cabinet in Miss Morgan's bedroom and found 20 to 30 audio tapes on a shelf in a hallway closet.
'I don't know what was on the tapes,' Welch said, adding that the material was turned over to Miss Morgan's family.
Pancoast, who once worked as a clerk for the William Morris talent agency and the Rogers & Cowan public relations firm, has recently undergone psychiatric treatment. He told reporters in jailhouse interviews two days after the slaying he killed Miss Morgan because she had made him her 'little slave boy.'
