Judge Orders Trial for Pair Accused in Cemetery Theft

BURBANK —  A Municipal Court judge on Monday ordered two men, accused of having items stolen from a Jewish cemetery and a human skull, to stand trial on charges of possession of human remains and vandalizing and stealing church property.

The decision prompted angry reactions from friends and relatives who say the suspects have been wrongly branded “neo-Nazis” by police and in news reports.

The case against Jacob Luis Gutierrez Rupe, 20, and Craig Matthew Lax, 21, both of Burbank, stems from an April search of their apartment, in which police found two signs--one commemorating the Holocaust and another belonging to a family plot--believed stolen from Mt. Sinai Memorial Park near Griffith Park, plus a human skull.

Some of the most serious charges also stem from a November incident, in which they were found by police in a van that contained grave markers and urns stolen from another Jewish cemetery. In that case, another man, Kevin Beardsley, 21, pleaded guilty to misdemeanor charges and paid thousands of dollars in restitution to the cemetery, but Rupe and Lax were not arrested due to lack of evidence.

Police have ruled out the possibility that the incidents were hate crimes, and prosecutors are no longer trying to link the suspects to antisemitic groups. But supporters of Rupe and Lax, about 40 of whom packed a courtroom Monday for their joint preliminary hearing, said initial police reports calling the defendants suspected neo-Nazi punk rockers were wrong and have damaged the men’s reputations.

“There is absolutely no way he is a neo-Nazi, a racist or a devil worshiper,” said Rupe’s brother, Jason Rupe, 22. “My brother and I are half Mexican. We have had to deal with racism all of our lives. Anyone who thinks he is a racist, or that he would tolerate racism, just doesn’t know him.”

Police obtained a warrant to search Rupe and Lax’s apartment after Benjamin Reynolds, an acquaintance of Rupe, told authorities he had seen a skull and two cemetery signs when he visited the apartment April 18.

Reynolds testified Monday that Rupe showed him the skull, asking if he would like to touch it.

“I asked him if he dug it up. He said no, it came from a crypt or mausoleum,” Reynolds testified. He added that Rupe had named the skull “Mr. Shane,” and had described how he had boiled the skull to clean it.

Outside the courtroom, Reynolds told a reporter that he notified police because he felt “it was wrong for them to have a skull.”

“That was going just a little too far,” he said.

Attorneys for Rupe and Lax failed to persuade Judge Rand Rubin to drop the charges against the suspects, or to reduce the charges from felonies to misdemeanors.

“For the exact same incidents that one misdemeanor count was filed against Mr. Beardsley for, we have three felony counts against Mr. Lax,” said Lax’s attorney, Cynthia Allen.

The two men were held in lieu of $30,000 bail each.