Stephanie Lazarus

But whatever the reason, a fun date with John Rutten often meant that you were destined for a gloomy outcome, even if it sometimes took a while.

A fellow student from the University of California, Los Angeles, named Stephanie Lazarus, cool last name, was one of his first casual partners in the early 1980s.

John was majoring in mechanical engineering, while Stephanie, originally from Simi Valley, was majoring in political science and sociology.

They both lived in the campus dorm at Dijkstra Hall and had shared a mutual love of all things sporty.

When you're only seeing it a couple of times a month, Stephanie, I'm not sure how seriously he should be taking this.

She often referred to him as her boyfriend, whereas John appeared to view it as more of a friends with benefits kind of thing.

he did introduce stephanie to his parents though which was unusual for him at the time that's not something he did with the other girls he dated during this non-exclusive relationship by 1984 it appeared that both of them had moved on stephanie lazarus would later go on to marry a police officer and the pair would adopt a daughter she would also carve out a pretty distinguished career for herself but stephanie's casual relationship with don john rootin would come back to haunt her much further down the line and it wasn't going to leave a happy ending Okay.

As for John, he became involved in a much more serious relationship by 1984.

[upbeat music]A California parole board has just considered parole once again for a former Los Angeles police detective convicted of murdering her ex-lover's new wife more than 40 years ago.

MK Confidential listeners will remember Stephanie Lazarus was convicted in 2012 of killing Sherri Rasmussen.

Sherri was shot three times in her Van Nuys co- condominium in 1986.

Sherri had married John Ruetten, a former love interest of the disgraced cop who would turn into a murderer just three months earlier, and Stephanie was obsessed with John and very angry at his new wife for existing.

Connie, great to see you again.

You too.

So once again, you and Rachel, I know you two have been going to each one of these, making sure that the parole board understands while Stephanie Lazarus says she's sorry now and purports to take responsibility for killing Sherri now, it's always half-measures.

She always says only enough that she thinks will get her a pass from the parole board, but never takes full accountability.

The family went as far as to offer a $10,000 reward for information because they were getting so frustrated.

They were particularly focused on a woman named Stephanie Lazarus.

I don't know about you, but sometimes I want to try a trend, but I don't wanna commit to buying it.

Because sometimes just because something's trendy does not mean [laughs] that it looks good on me.

But they were shocked when they found out that this third-party female in fact had never been investigated.

Now, who do you think this third-party female is, Megan?

This is clearly gonna be Stephanie Lazarus, the ex-girlfriend of John-

Mm-hmm

Her goal in life was to help people in need.

What's so shocking is that her killer went on to have a career helping people as well by solving crimes.

That's because her killer turned out to be a rookie police officer named Stephanie Lazarus, and she would eventually become a police detective for the LAPD.

And it's probably going to be shocking when you hear just how brutal this murder was and how Stephanie Lazarus used all of her knowledge to try

and get away with it.

There also was evidence of rage or anger.

That possibility was further fueled by the bite mark on Sherry's arm.

Why would a killer bite her if they could just shoot her? And since she had been shot multiple times, beaten, and had a vase broken on her head, it seemed like overkill with anger.