Fatal Attraction: The Book Is Never Closed — Ep. 4 | MK Confidential

0:00Stephanie Lazarus sits in front of a camera in a California state prison and answers questions under oath. It is February 12th 2025. Stephanie is 64 years old and she has been in state custody for almost 16 years. She really wants to get out. On the other side of the video screen, Sherri Rasmussen's two sisters Connie and Teresa are watching. So are Sherri's two nieces and John Rutton. Sherri's husband. The man Stephanie killed Sherri over and still lost. A parole commissioner named Kevin Sheppell asks Stephanie about a phone call she made on a February morning in 1986. Sherri had answered. Sheppell asks what Stephanie felt when she heard Sherri's voice. Yes sir, I was enraged. Stephanie says she went down the stairs of her condominium and took a cord off of her workbench. Sheppell asks her why she brought that cord with her to John and Sherri's

1:02home. Because I was so angry that if she got in my way to see John, I was going to strangle her. Sheppell asks what she was thinking by the time she reached Sherri Rasmussen's front door. I'm going to kill her if I don't see John. Sherri's younger sister Teresa watches her screen listening to Stephanie talk about murdering Sherri. At these parole hearings Teresa makes a point of staying visible. She told us why. Personally, I make a effort to be sure that I'm on the screen the whole time that so she has to if she looks up she has to see me. But she never looks up. Stephanie says she barged into Sherri's home asking for John and from there she describes what happened as a delicious fight. Kevin Sheppell stops her. Why are you calling it a fight? Stephanie thinks about this. I invaded her home. I was an intruder. So maybe it was just a

2:06fight on my part. Her trying to maybe defend herself would be a better description of the situation. Sheppell offers a different word. What about assault and Stephanie agrees with that. Stephanie describes a violent struggle hitting Sherri in the face with her gun then biting her and smashing a vase over her head. And Stephanie says she picks up a blanket from the floor, wraps it around her gun and fires three times into Sherri's chest. Sheppell comes back to that. When I think of someone in a rage they're just out of it. They're not thinking about well I need to wrap this up. Why did you wrap the gun up? Stephanie shifts her eyes and answers to dead in the sound. I'm Megan Kelly and this is MK Confidential. Everybody's talking about weight loss injections because the results can be so dramatic. They work by lowering blood sugar and reducing appetite. But what if

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4:1032 months through preliminary hearings, motions and other pre-trial proceedings. She comes to court shackled in an orange jail jumpsuit. Then on February 6th 2012 the first day of her trial she appears dressed in black. She pleads not guilty. She will not testify. Prosecutors tell the jury that Stephanie Lazarus killed Sherry Razzincin because of a love triangle. John Rutton chose Sherry instead of her. They put the old evidence back on the table. The swabs from Sherry's arm. The 38 caliber revolver that Lazarus reported stolen after the murder. And Stephanie's own words about John preserved in letters, diary entries and photographs. And then they call John Rutton to the stand. John is 53. A reporter in the courtroom watches him choke up several times and reach for a box of Kleenex when he is asked about the day his Sherry died. The prosecution begins with the relationship. John testifies that he and Stephanie

5:16Lazarus slept together somewhere between 25 and 30 times over roughly three years beginning the summer after he graduated from UCLA. Justice Stephanie herself predicted when questioned by robbery homicide in their surprise interview. John says he did not consider Stephanie his girlfriend. John says that in the summer of 1985 weeks after he asked Sherry to marry him, Stephanie called him crying, asking to see him. So he went over and they had sex. As to explain it, he says quote, basically she had no closure. She was upset. I felt bad. I was a stupid and young man. Sherry's younger sister Teresa Lane is in the courtroom. She's hearing for the first time that John slept with Stephanie after he and Sherry were engaged. When we spoke with Teresa for this series, she still remembered what that moment felt like. I was devastated. I'm sorry, it's

6:24hard. Sherry's older sister Connie Wilkinson is in the courtroom too. John's behavior after the murder has bothered Connie for years as she told us. It wasn't as difficult for me to hear it because John's in my opinion, John's behavior around Sherry's death was suspect to me. He delayed notifying my parents until after they couldn't get a flight out of Tucson. And my parents weren't notified until his parents were there to support him. Also when my dad asked him, how did you know Sherry was dead? He goes that he used his foot and touched her with his foot and she didn't move. Those are behaviors I don't see as a loving, caring, loving husband. Teresa who says she's still in touch with John sees him differently. Sherry knew about

7:27the incident with Stephanie before they got married. Did he do wrong? Hell yes. But my sister was still willing to walk down that aisle and say I do. So I am going to support my sister in that. Then Stephanie Lazarus's defense attorney Mark Overland gets his turn to cross examine John. Overland argues that it was John not Stephanie who could not let the relationship go. John is already dabbing at his eyes when Overland takes him back to the night he had sex with Stephanie after becoming engaged to Sherry and to whether John tried to clean up before going home. The attorney asks did you take a shower before leaving Miss Lazarus's place? John rotten looks down. I don't recall that. The defense attacks the bite mark evidence. Overland points to that hole in the corner of the evidence envelope which poked straight through the case number and argues that someone could have used it to remove the tube and tamper with the

8:31swab. There is a second swab inside that tube. An independent lab tests the second swab with a defense representative in the room. It too comes back with the same DNA profile as the first. Stephanie Lazarus. The odds that the 15 DNA markers belong to anyone other than Stephanie Lazarus are about one in 1.7 sex-tillion. 17 days after the trial begins on March 8th the jury comes back with a verdict. We the jury in above-entital action pointed at the end of Stephanie I.D. Lazarus guilty of the crime of murder or sharing rastmas school. Teresa watches Stephanie as the verdict is read. She showed nothing. I mean a woman that I mean have to have I assume people have feelings. I think the best of people that she did not

9:33shutter. She didn't do anything. She didn't even blink. She looked forward and there was nothing left in her soul. Nell's and Loretta Rasmussen stay in their seats in the second row sobbing. Two months later on May 11th 2012 Stephanie Lazarus is back in the same courthouse for sentencing. She gets 27 years to life. Sherry's family stands one by one and tells the court what her murder has done to them. John Rutten speaks to. The fact that Sherry's death occurred because she met and married me brings me to my knees. I have resigned myself to trying to endure the daydreams about a world where Sherry is still with us. Miss Pointless tragedy never occurred. Teresa remembers watching Stephanie while John spoke. I remember him standing up there and talking

10:35and Stephanie did not move. Lynch blink or anything that woman has no soul at all. Stephanie Lazarus says nothing for Connie and Teresa it feels like the end of the story. It was relief that finally that she will pay for what she did. Unrealistic but it was like it was like okay now we can close the book but it's the book is never closed. You know that after the verdict. I thought it was going to be closed. I thought it would be a done deal that she would be there for the 25 years but it hasn't stopped after the verdict. It hasn't I mean we don't get a rest. Sherry Rasmussen was murdered in February of 1986. Stephanie Lazarus was arrested in June 2009. 23 years. The question of what's taking so long has haunted this case from the very beginning. Connie says their father, Nell's Rasmussen,

11:40who was tortured by the fact that he could not protect his daughter in life, became determined to avenge her in death. He began doing his own detective work the day after Sherry died. The way that dad coped with the loss of Sherry was to be very analytical and go over every detail, everything that she had said to him. So he did have a short list. Stephanie was on the list. Of course we didn't know her name. We just knew that next girlfriend that was a police officer. According to Connie, Nell's Rasmussen gave the detectives two leads back in 1986. A woman at the hospital who had been passed over for a promotion and had been making calls to Sherry and the police officer. In his book The Lazarus Files author Matthew McGuff reports that Nell's early on tried repeatedly to raise the possibility of John's ex and her involvement to no avail. Without Mayor's clearance that likely ticked Mayor off, Nell's also discussed with Mayor the

12:46two bullets recovered during Sherry's off-hop. In his 2009 LAPD interview, Nell have recounted I met her on his own without Mayor's clearance that likely ticked Mayor off. Nell's also discussed with Mayor the two bullets recovered during Sherry's off-hop. In his 2009 LAPD interview, Nell's recounted, I mentioned to Lyle the fact that they were similar if not the same as what police are issued. According to Nell's Mayor never acknowledged what Nell said about the bullets. He never acknowledged he wouldn't deny it, he wouldn't say okay or whatever. He would just go on with whatever he wanted to talk about Nell's informed the LAPD in 2009. As things went along with Mayor day by day that week, Nell's became ever more insistent and emotional about bringing up the subject that seemed to irritate Mayor the West. John's ex-girlfriend, the female cop, Nell's felt Mayor was on his case from Wednesday on. After a certain point, according to Nell's,

13:50whenever he met with Mayor, Mayor got loud with him. Mayor was not afraid to let Nell's know he didn't want his input and often punctuated their conversations with petal and gestures, like slamming a book down, throwing papers, or handing something to Nell's and then grabbing it back from him. Lyle Mayor, the lead detective, says none of that ever happened. No one from the family told him about a police officer, he says, not even one time. And if they had, he would have run the lead down. According to Nell's, Mayor responded to his theories with, you've been watching too much television. I asked Connie and Teresa how they reconcile those two accounts and what they believe kept the investigation from moving. Here's a critical question. Do you believe that Lyle Mayor didn't want to talk about the police officer who John used to date because he wanted to back the blue and cover up for a fellow police officer or because he had tunnel vision on his

14:52burglar theory. Connie, I'll start with you on that. I believe he had tunnel vision because if you look at the murder book and the first interview when they come to the site, he already had labeled it as a burglary. So he was not open to discussing any other theories or alternatives. And what about Mayor's denial? I don't believe that. I don't believe anything that Lyle Mayor says. I know my brother-in-law has told me that he said to the police when he was first questioned after Sherry died that he had a girlfriend that was in the police department. And John has told me that and my dad followed up. The sisters agree that the Los Angeles Police Department failed to seriously investigate Stephanie Lazarus. They are less certain about why. I was naive at the time. I was very young. And I believe that the police were doing everything they

15:55could. And they were pursuing it with an honest heart. And I don't believe that happened in that sort of as distressing to me. On March 12, 1986, 16 days after the murder, the LAPD gives John Rutton a polygraph exam. The result is inconclusive. According to the murder book, Rutton was too emotional to give an accurate reading. Mayor says the two key questions were, are you personally involved and do you personally know who killed her? On both of those, he was deemed credible. There are seven questions listed for the exam. Not one of them is about Stephanie Lazarus. 20 months later, on November 19, 1987, someone writes one line at the bottom of page 18 of the murder book chronology. John Rutton called Verified Stephanie Lazarus, dash PO, was former girlfriend. Her name is in the murder book. Her job is in the murder book. Her relationship to the husband

17:02is in the murder book. Exactly once. That one line is the only time Stephanie Lazarus appears in the file for the next 22 years. The handwriting has never been identified. The detectives are no closer to finding her. Then sometime in 1992 or 1993, Nell's and LaRetta and Connie drive to Van Aes trying to restart the case. Nell's asks whether anyone had run DNA and offers to pay for it himself. The detective who tells him no is Steve Fisk who runs Van Aes homicide. He sets a thin manila folder on the table between them. A tiny case file. According to Matthew McGuff's book on the case, Fisk says there is no point in running DNA without a suspect. Nell's points at the manila folder quote, I think it's in your record there about John's ex-girlfriend. Fisk says nothing. Connie later says he seemed eager for them to leave. Early Monday afternoon, October 11, 1993,

18:07a homicide detective from Van Aes drives to the Los Angeles County Coroner's office about 30 minutes from the station. His name is Phil Morit. He works under Steve Fisk. Morit is listed as the signatory taking out all trace evidence collected from Sherry Rasmussen's body. It is never seen again. It disappears from the record entirely. Years later, Morit acknowledges the signature on the paperwork appears to be his but says he does not remember taking the evidence and says he never worked on Sherry's case. There is no mention of this removal in the murder book. No one tells the Rasmussen family. Sherry's sister Connie has been trying to make sense of it ever since. One thing we do know is that Stephanie Lazarus was stationed at the Van Aes police division during the 90s. So I don't she had a relationship or worked with with that

19:09individual detective or she may have done and moved the items herself and put his signature. Who knows? I'll win a know is that it's gone. Stephanie Lazarus is transferred to Van Aes in March of 1995, which is a year and a half after the trace evidence leaves the coroner's office. She works out of that station on and off for the rest of the decade. Sherry Rasmussen's murder book is in the building, unsaccured the entire time. Stephanie is there. She often volunteers to work the morning shift, a time when the building is mostly empty, particularly of higher ranks. Whether she ever cracked it open or altered what was inside, no one can say for sure. I asked Teresa for her opinion. I don't see why she wouldn't have because if you look at her track record from the day she killed my sister to 26 years later, she has...

20:12everything is self-serving. So she has no regards for anybody else. I hate to think the worst of people to tell you the truth. But if you look at her life and how she dealt with her family during the trial and lied that she didn't kill my sister, she has no conscious about other people. I mean, her only thing is her well-being and what she wants to accomplish in her life and her goal. That evidence is not the only thing missing from the investigation. The original handwritten log of the first three months after Sherry died disappears from the murder book sometime between 1986 and 2008. No one knows when, who took it, or why. It is the only real-time record of what the detectives did to track down her murderer, including possible meetings with family members and various leads.

21:13Only a copy of the log prepared on a typewriter by someone survives. It is dated three months after the murder and it is attached to the 60-day report. It is supposed to be word-for-word accurate. Without the original, there is no way to verify that. John Rutton's name is misspelled as, rudder, throughout. The break in the case comes from a piece of evidence Phil Morret left behind at the coroner. A bite mark swab from Sherry's left arm tucked away in the basement freezer, but it only comes after the case changes hands. Mayer has retired, Steve Fisk moves on. Cliff Shepard is now in charge, an LAPD cold case detective from the respected robbery homicide division. When criminalist Jennifer Francis finds female DNA in saliva from the bite mark, it is because Cliff Shepard first asked for a fresh look at the forensics, but Shepard does not respond meaningfully to the news that the bite mark was from

22:18a woman, Jennifer's discovery. Jennifer calls Shepard a few weeks later. She asks him about the rasmussen case and the other woman. She means that nurse, who the murder book says harassed Sherry at work. Shepard's reply surprises her. Oh, you mean the LAPD detective? She was not a part of this. He does not say that detective's name and Jennifer Francis does not ask how she has supposedly been ruled out. That ruled out female detective's name is in the binder on her desk. Just one line, page 18 written in 1987, Stephanie Lazarus, PO, former girlfriend. Francis had read right past it. Four more years pass with no movement. Then Jim Nudol is handed the murder book and starts over. AI can clone your voice, forge your signature, even create fake documents that fool experts

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24:19make sure you are not already a victim. That's hometitelock.com promo code Megan or use the link in the description. Friday, June 5, 2009. Sherry's little sister Teresa Lane is living in Sierra Vista, Arizona. She receives an urgent cryptic message from her parents. And then they called me and they said, you need to be up here today. And I said, okay, which was, you know, sort of a nice thing and a worse thing at the same time. The family gathers at Nell's and LaRetta's home in Tucson. And LAPD detectives are already there. They will not say why. We were sitting around in my parents' family room. And my dad was questioning that detectives just see what was going on. They said they couldn't say anything until the arrest was made. And then once the arrest was made, they came in and told us that who they arrested. Stephanie Lazarus has just been taken into custody for murder.

25:28The DNA from a Costco cup. Teresa remembers hearing the news. It was a relief, but it was just a new starting point. After Stephanie's arrest, the Rasmussen's file, a two-park claim against the city of Los Angeles. First, alleging that Stephanie Lazarus used her position as an officer to commit and cover up her crime, literally, to get away with murder. Second, that the LAPD protected Stephanie Lazarus and helped cover for her through fraud, negligence, and other wrongful acts. A judge dismisses the lawsuit before discovery begins, primarily on the grounds of governmental immunity. No witness is ever questioned under oath. No police documents are ever handed over. No court will ever decide whether the LAPD covered for one of its own. On February 6, 2012, Stephanie Lazarus pleads not guilty. She does not testify at her trial.

26:34After being found guilty, she says nothing at her sentencing. She appeals her conviction and loses, then appeals again and loses. Lazarus never publicly admits to killing Sherry Rasmussen. That is, until doing so could work to her advantage. November 16, 2023, the California Institution for Women near Chino, California. Stephanie Lazarus' parole hearing. Two commissioners, Lazarus, and her lawyer are present. The Rasmussen family joins on a video screen. Connie, Teresa, Tunees, John Rutton, and LAPD Detective Greg Sterns. Sterns is one of the detectives who interrogated Lazarus before her arrest in 2009. A California law makes offenders who were younger than 26 when they committed their crime, eligible for parole earlier than usual. Stephanie Lazarus was 25 years,

27:36nine months, and 20 days old when she murdered Sherry Rasmussen. The board asks Stephanie what she did. She describes driving over to the condominium and barging in asking for John. She mentions the cord she brought and the vase. Then she says the gun came out of her fanny pack and she and Sherry struggled over it. Two shots went into the sliding glass door upstairs. Lazarus regained control of her weapon. The hearing is not recorded on video, but it is transcribed. And here is some of what Lazarus said word for word. She stumbles throughout. Quote, at some point she had me in a chokehold and I couldn't get out of the chokehold. I hit her several times to the right side of her face with my gun. I still couldn't get out. Eventually, I bit her. She continues, I picked up a blanket or a rogue, something off the floor. I wrapped it around my gun and I shot her three times to the chest.

28:38Stephanie adds quote, what I didn't do is I didn't check her pulse. I didn't give her CPR. I didn't call 911. All I cared about was my selfish self to get out of there. The presiding commissioner Patricia Cassidy asks, why would you give her CPR when you were trying to kill her? Stephanie backpedals and stammeres. She's just saying that she could have and that she went to the condo to talk to John. Cherry was just in her way. Lazarus admits to the board that she staged the scene to look like a burglary and drove off and Cherry's car. She says that after the murder, John Rutton mentioned that he had given her name to the police. Lazarus threw the revolver she had used to kill Cherry off a freeway. Then she reported the gun stolen to the Santa Monica police department because she was certain the LAPD would come and ask her for it. No one ever did. For 37 years, Connie and Teresa had waited for Stephanie Lazarus to save the words. Connie remembers

29:43hearing them. The first time that we heard that she admitted that she was murdered Cherry was at the first parole hearing. Up to that, she exercised every appeal in every way possible to get out of prison. But she is still lying. Every parole hearing, it's not the whole truth. It's a portion of the truth. Maybe enough to get her old. It works. That day, the board finds Stephanie Lazarus suitable for parole. After serving just 11 and a half years of a 27-year sentence, after the board's decision, LAPD's chief Michael Moore writes to the governor of California, Gavin Newsom, and asks him to intervene. Moore writes that Lazarus continues to pose an unreasonable risk to the public. Newsom formally recommends a second look. He sends the decision back to the full

30:47board of parole hearings to reconsider and they schedule a hearing. October 2, 2024. The board has no questions for Lazarus. It will decide based on the record from the last one and will allow statements. Stephanie speaks for seven minutes about the programs she has completed in prison. Greg Sterns is there in support of John Rutton. Sterns describes the crime to the board and makes the case that the young offenders law should not apply to Stephanie. In his view, this is a clearly premeditated and thoughtful crime. Quote, Stephanie Lazarus stalked her victim. She chose a time and a place when she knew that she would have the victim alone. She brought cordage to bind her, used an improvised suppressor to execute her, staged a burglary. Those are not the hallmarks of youthful offense. They are the hallmarks of criminal sophistication and maturity. John Rutton speaks as well. Quote, every day she went to work as a police officer was a lie.

31:51The inmate has exercised her rights to the fullest but never has never done the right thing. The full board rescinds the grant for Stephanie's parole. She stays behind bars for now. Which brings us back to where this episode began. February 12, 2025. This is the hearing where parole commissioner Sheppell will not let Stephanie Lazarus call the killing of fight. It is also where he asks her how she found Sherry's address. That's a good question, Stephanie, seems to stall. I would say that I probably accessed LAPD records to obtain where she lived. Later Lazarus's own attorney takes her back to the morning of the murder and asks what her plan was when she left her house. She responds, quote, to murder Sherry Resverson. And there it is for the first time, clearly. Beyond the murder confession, Detective Greg Stern's calls out another crime for the board to consider.

32:55For the first time today, Ms. Lazarus admitted what we long suspected that she utilized police databases in order to obtain the address of John and Sherry. That's a felony in the state of California. Perollas denied. She will soon be eligible again. Sherry's sister Teresa Lane was in the room that February. She says the pattern is always the same. Every parole hearing we've done with Stephanie. She adds a little more details about the crime. She'll add a little tidbit here in there. She never tells the whole story. So I assume this next parole hearing she's going to add a little bit more information. The next parole war hearing is almost here. October 9th, 2026. The same prison dialing in on the same video screen. Connie is confident they will be prepared. We have an excellent team. I can say that we are blessed.

33:57I asked Connie whether there was something specific in the year since 1986 that she wished her sister Sherry had been there for. When mom was critically ill and passed away, I would have liked to have would have liked to have Sherry there in their process and caring for my mom. It was especially as a nurse. Well, we're both nurses, but it sometimes it helps to bounce your ideas and the symptoms you're seeing off someone with someone else and talk it through. There are two people who will not be logging on for the next parole hearing. After the sentencing in 2012, Nell's and Loretta Rasmussen sat down in front of a camera and recorded victim impact statements about the loss of their daughter. They did so just in case they were gone by the time Stephanie Lazarus came up for parole, which turned out to be prescient. Nell's died in the summer of 2020. Loretta followed

34:59in 2022. At the 2023 hearing, the family asks to play those recordings. The video files are too large for the state's system and they will not play in the room. So one of the granddaughters Rachel Buck asks to read the transcripts allowed. Rachel tells the commissioner her grandparents would rest better knowing their words had been heard. The commissioner agrees Greg Sterns finds a copy and Rachel reads her grandparents statements into the record. Here is part of what Sherry's mother, Loretta, recorded in her statement about Sherry. For her hearing, she knew she might not attend. Loretta, who loved Sherry so much, was always described as the soft one. Quote, she thought so hard to live and it always worried me what she must have gone through. I would just like to say to the parole board, I beg you not to let this person out. Sherry's father echoed his wife. First, about the murder and Stephanie Lazarus. Quote,

36:05I've been able to stand up to many problems in life, but this one has put me on the ground because I think of such a senseless killing. The selfishness that took place is just beyond me. He continued, we have grandchildren and great-grandchildren now, and not only do we miss Sherry, but we miss the children that she would bring into this world. And knowing Sherry, she would have been a terrific mother and her children would have been tremendous kids. John Rutton remarried and stayed in California. He now has two sons and a granddaughter. Teresa Lane tells me that the trial for her sister Sherry's murder reached John's second family too. He's told me this many times that the trial came about when his sons were in high school. You know, it was very publicized. And also they realized their dad cheated on his wife. They have a good life, but you know, it affects them as much as it affects us daily. Teresa has remained friends with John Rutton.

37:09Connie has not. But Connie is careful to say this. John has been very strong advocate and it has really showed up for Sherry in regards to the parole hearing, so I appreciate that. I asked Connie what she really think led to her sister's murder. Do you think this was a fatal attraction where she was just obsessed with John and could not have him be married to another woman, Connie? Yes, I do. Her perception of the relationship and then what how John describes their relationship is very different. He considers her an acquaintance or she considers him his, you know, her, his, what her boyfriend. So I think she had in her mind what she wanted and she was going to get it no matter what. Sherry never got to have the children. She so badly wanted. Stephanie Lazarus made sure of that. But Sherry's own family never stopped loving or fighting for her.

38:13When she went off to California, Nell's wrote to her, quote, we all need a friend from time to time to talk to. I hope I will always qualify. He modeled the importance of a family first life showing his children how to never lose touch and never give up. Now Connie and Teresa appear at every parole board hearing and do media around them to keep the pressure on officials not to release their sister's killer. When I asked them one last question about Sherry, the sisters who lived with learned from and loved her so much told me this. I don't know if you're religious people if you believe in heaven, a god. But I wonder if you do, what do you think Sherry's going to say to you when you see her again? Well, I think she's going to be proud of us for fighting for her. And she's going to be really excited to see us. Now hopefully we're not as old as we are right now

39:16when we see her. But yeah, not too soon. I think she'd be so grateful to both of you. You've been just true warriors. Every sister should be so lucky as to have two sisters like you. Thank you for telling her story and yours. Thank you. I'm Megan Kelly. This is MK Confidential.