ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, May 2, 1996 TAG: 9605020049
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-8 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: LOS ANGELES
SOURCE: LINDA DEUTSCH ASSOCIATED PRESS
IS HE DEAD, or is Ron Levin alive? That's an important question to the man serving a life sentence for arranging Levin's death.
It was a rainy Christmas Day in 1987. At a small restaurant on the Greek island of Mykonos, a door blew open, letting in a bitter wind, the witness recalled. A familiar figure stepped inside.
``I thought to myself, `God, I know this person,''' Connie Gerrard testified.
It was Ron Levin, she said. No doubt about it.
But how could that be? Levin was supposed to be dead, murdered in 1984 by the Billionaire Boys Club, a group of ruthlessly ambitious young men who put their money into get-rich-quick schemes.
Like Elvis, though, Levin has been sighted all over, long after he supposedly died - at the movies, at a funeral, in the Greek islands, in Los Angeles.
The Levin sightings are the basis of an effort to win a new trial for Joe Hunt, the 36-year-old former Billionaire Boys leader who was sentenced to life without parole for ordering Levin's murder.
At a hearing under way in Superior Court, Hunt's lawyers contend that Levin, a con man whose body was never found, faked his death and framed Hunt.
Prosecutors, for their part, insist Hunt was convicted on firm evidence. They have refused to comment on the sightings but said in court papers that they will call witnesses to cast doubt on the stories such as these:
Gerrard said that in Greece, ``When Mr. Levin saw me, his facial expression changed. I saw the recognition on his face, and he kind of paled.'' She said he quickly left.
George Gerrard, her husband, corroborated the account and said, after seeing photos of Levin, ``I'm sure this is the man I saw in the restaurant.''
Nadia Ghaleb, former maitre d' at a Beverly Hills restaurant, testified that one morning in 1987, she was driving to work and spotted Levin getting into a brown Mercedes convertible. ``I said, `Oh my God, there's Ron Levin. I haven't seen that guy in a long time.'''
She said she knew Levin in the 1970s and '80s and remembered his distinctive looks: tall, prematurely silver-haired, immaculately groomed in trendy clothes and always exuding ``a slightly suspicious air.''
Ivan Werner, a funeral director, identified Levin as a mourner at a Westwood funeral in 1987. He said the man had white hair, a close-cropped beard and was impeccably groomed. Werner said he saw Levin's picture in the paper several months later and recognized him as the mourner.
The witnesses eventually told their stories to police but did not testify at Hunt's 1987 trial.
Prosecutors contend Levin was killed after swindling Hunt in a $4 million commodities scam.
A Hunt cohort, James Pittman, who pleaded guilty in 1987 to being an accessory after the fact, said on TV's ``A Current Affair'' in 1993 that he shot Levin in front of Hunt and helped bury the body in the Angeles National Forest.
Law officers' repeated forays into the 1,100-square-mile wilderness yielded no trace of the body.
The evidence against Hunt included a seven-page ``to do'' list in his handwriting, found in Levin's apartment. It included phrases such as: ``Tape mouth, close blinds, handcuff, put gloves on, kill dog.''
LENGTH: Medium: 74 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: AP. Attorneys for Joe Hunt, the 36-year-old formerby CNBBillionaire Boys leader, contend that Ron Levin, a con man whose
body was never found, faked his death and framed Hunt.