Welcome to Wonderland 1981 – True Crime & Rare History
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Another excerpt from the book “What Wild Ecstasy” by John Heidenry. You can read samples of it here.
I wonder if the Gang had ordered food from Captain Pizza? That is the pizza joint that was mentioned in the movie. I guess whoever showed up at 3:45am did not care enough to save Susan. I have also been trying to find out what was on TV that night, but in the summertime it used to be all reruns of old shows on local TV. There were no network shows on during the summertime, besides the occasional made-for-TV movie.
A few pages later, the author describes the Nash robbery, almost verbatim to Lind’s testimony. He did good research. The author does not seem to care much for Holmes. Oh well, he did his due diligence!
The rest of the book is also excellent… and Heidenry touches on the early porn world, the business side, emerging technologies, the origins of professional porn businesses in Denmark and Germany, etc.
During his trial, Holmes’ defense of being “the man in the middle” and under duress, would later be written in as a new defense in many law school textbooks. The same goes for the smuggling case of Ron Launius in 1974, but his case had to do with Double Jeopardy sentencing guidelines, etc. Ron’s case versus the US government has been cited by no less than 22 other legal cases over the years.
I truly wish Coen could have gotten a conviction. Holmes would have rolled over on Eddie for sure being the shit weasel that he was. I guess that was too much to ask for though.
Me too. It’s a tough ride, Holmes would have rolled. You were right the whole time.. The gang also had Sac town obligations and court dates for petty crimes.
Do you know why Ron Launius changed that way? It seems that in the beginning he was living a conservative lifestyle. Didn’t he get along with his life in the military or did he get troubles after leaving the military?
And is it true what internet sources say that he went to the Mexican border to deal drugs for bikers, then his girlfriend was kidnapped and when he got her back he wiped out all of the dealers?
Not certain about the kidnapping stuff. I have not been able to confirm those stories. But… he had a good tour in the Air Force, serving almost 10 years with an honorable discharge from the service. I think that after the military and getting married, he just go disgruntled, worked a few dead end jobs and then go into drugs and easy money. He got busted smuggling drugs from Mexico and served his prison time. It was all downhill, so to speak, from there.
Chuck Negron was one of a trio of singers in the band Three Dog Night. He is best known for his vocals on “Joy to the World” (Jeremiah was a bullfrog…yada yada). During his partying days in the 70s and early 80s, he was also an acquaintance of the Wonderland Gang and used to buy drugs from them. This is mentioned in his autobiography, and he did not live far from the famous house at 8763 Wonderland Avenue.
Chuck claims to have set up a drug buy for the night of the murders, but for some reason did not make it or was told to come by another day. The gang had been partying hard and may have needed rest, according to David Lind. Dave spent that fateful night at a San Fernando Valley motel consuming drugs with a hooker.
Also interesting is that in the crime scene video, one can clearly see a blood splattered album next to the first victim in the living room. The album shown is turned around and this is the back cover of “Harmony” by Three Dog Night:
If Chuck was stopping by, maybe they were getting familiar with his music? Screen capture from crime scene video.
An enlarged version. Was this the last music heard by the Wonderland Gang? Susan Launius and Barbara Richardson had not been staying at the house very long, and I bet they were jamming to this album thinking that Chuck was stopping by… were they about to meet a famous person?
That’s it. All of the persons in the photo match up below…
Here is what the back of the album looks like:
This album featured “Just an Old Fashioned Love Song”, a big hit in 1972.
Thanks for the great blog, John. I do enjoy your writings about the topics you post about. Very in line with my curiosities. Keep up the good work, man. You have developed a great blog. Love it.
The Canyon Country Store is a world famous stop off for groceries and drinks in the Hollywood Hills. Famous rock’n’roll groupie, Pamela Des Barres, even hung out in the parking lot with her friend hoping to meet rock stars who would emerge from the maze of streets in this popular area for celebs. Some other well known patrons were… you guessed it, the Wonderland Gang. In fact, according to David Lind, Joy and Barbara headed to the store right after the boys returned home from robbing Eddie Nash. It’s true. Billy, Dave and Ron were counting and sorting the loot in Ron’s room, while the girls went for booze and cigs. It was party time. Susan was not at the house yet, so poor John Holmes had to wait in the living room by himself, pacing back and forth to see what his take would be. When he got his share of the cocaine, he immediately went to the stove to cook up some rock (as most people do). It’s as Ron said in the movie: “Do I look like I’m f–n hungry! The only thing I want to heat up is some dope!”
And with that, we bring you the Wonderland Country Store:
Photo credit: BonnieBrae
Photo credit: BonnieBrae
The Route from Wonderland. 1.4 miles in 5 minutes.
We’ve all read the bio, Eddie Nash (Adel Nasrallah), a Palestinian born immigrant, arrived in L.A. with $7 in his pocket. After waiting tables, he bought his first hot dog stand and he grew into a huge entertainment tycoon. By the 1970s, he was really freeking loaded. His main rackets were his night clubs. They covered as a front for his other activities, vices and crimes as well. He was quite a generous guy though. If you have not read about the women he loved and how he once helped a woman and her autistic son, google it. Get out the Kleenex first. Heartwarming!
This post features a few of his old clubs. A music venue and a teen dance club. At one point Eddie Nash had 25+ liquor licenses in the Los Angeles area. This gives you a picture of his largess, and what the business scene was like behind the wild man… who was Eddie Nash. The King of L.A. I feel it is right to document these things because if too much time goes by, the facts are lost forever.
This music and concert club catered to local and int’l bands alike. It was open from 1972 to 1981. “Rubicon” played the CalJam ’77 I think.
Of course, you had to have a teen dance club. Eddie brought you, “Odyssey”!
There’s a two ecstasy limit, please.
This great site (LAist) tells the history of the Odyssey club, and how after having their dance license revoked at the club, kids staged what appeared to be a protest, but it looks really cheezy and fake:
So, when you think about it. The city and the cops were sick of Eddie. What does he do? Eddie Nash probably had the place burned down a few nights later, for the insurance money. I believe he was acquitted of this fraud charge though, but a few of his other businesses had “burned down” in the past. He got away with stuff. So the police messed with him all the time after Wonderland. Before Wonderland, he flew just under their radar. For the rest of the 80s though he would be in a world of legal shit, multiple arrests, trials, short stints in jail or prison for drugs, all the way up until the 2000 trial (where he did like 2 years of a 4 year sentence due to old age). LAPD never got that feather in their cap though. The cops never really nailed him for Wonderland. That’s too bad. All of the other witnesses were dead. It was by then a lost cause. Twenty years later too. They were lucky to get what they got with Eddie. He was slick.
Burned, like so much freebase. Wanna Play Baseball!! (anyone)
Nash owned several more clubs catering to black folks, gays, older crowd, tropical theme, blues bar, etc. I could not find pictures of them. Please send if you have any. Thanks!
Bonnie Brae
9:58 pm on September 24, 2012 Permalink
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LOL – that footage is hilarious. It totally looks fake. Hilare. I’m pretty sure we had an Odyssey in San Diego. The music to Footloose really takes the cake. At the end the guy saying that when the club closes they pick up trash around the area. hmmm that is what I always did in high school when i was falling over drunk at the end of a party. I’d comb the local neighborhoods looking for trash to pick up.
Yes! and I don’t remember people dressing that bad, but I guess they did. You should have seen my sweet dark brown polyester uniform from Pizza Hut with the matching Andy Capp hat. I was a cook and dishwasher. Great pizza though.
I have found a page that is basically al about the oddessey & the regulars who used to go there… It has pics & everything and tons of posts from all the former club kids who used to go there…. It’s really interesting, there’s also a site called the go-go’s notebook & it”s about the starwood
I have chatted with many former employees of Odyssey1, including iconic DJ Chuck Starr, and it was NOT owned by Nash – it was owned by Stott and Bud Harvey, Chris Cox and a cousin of Chris’. Nash DID own Starwood, Seven Seas and another couple of clubs
I believe the Nash simply owned the building (and it burned down eventually)
Darla Hershman
11:13 pm on April 20, 2017 Permalink
I just wanted to respond to a post earlier from Brandy. Larry Hershman ” Cherokee” who was my father passed away on October 19, 2016 from lung cancer. May he RIp
I wish there were more information about the clubs Nash owned, at least addresses. I find it strange there’s not more documentation about this. I live in Los Angeles and I am interested in the location history and I want to know what’s there now. I know where The Seven Seas was, The Starwood and Soul’d Out were but can’t pinpoint the rest. You seem to have investigated a lot of this extensively, isn’t there a way to figure this out?
J.P. McPickleshitter
9:55 am on January 16, 2021 Permalink
| Reply
Here’s an odd connection: In the early ’80’s, going by her book, Christy Canyon (who worked with Holmes) lived in the building that was home to the Seven Seas.
James historiographer
10:36 am on March 13, 2021 Permalink
| Reply
Hello everyone. I am a historiographer and I am looking into Eddie Nash and his connections for his drugs in before 1967. Eddie seemed to blow up and he was associated with many organized crime figures. JFK was hit by the French Corsicans and the American Italian Mafia. JFK ordered everyone to withdraw from Vietnam, 15,000 advisors effectively immediately (Robert McNamara Memoir). Vietnam by 1967 had become a mass producing heroin epicenter. The French Corsican’s were in Indochina since the 1940’s.
The story of Vichy France teaches us that the Corsicans wound up in every French colony after the war. France had been blown apart 1940 and to preserve the high-society the Corsicans and people from Marseilles collaborated with the German Nazis. After the war, the French Corsican gangsters / soldiers robbed the Germans. The Corsicans were with the French since WWI. Paul Carbone was in Belgium on the front lines fighting. Some of these really tuff guy types that were real gangsters robbed the Germans after WWII and started the first heroin facilities in the late 1940’s. Some of these seriously connected and very dangerous soldiers wound up in our OSS and then CIA located in South East Asia for their language skills. During Vichy France 1940 Vietnam was an outpost. French Foreign Legion, French Regular Army and these Corsicans slipped into the German Occupied camps together and they made a war bond to protect the colonies. These guys went to every French colony after the war.
The Corsicans were the main force behind the JFK Assassination and I believe the French Corsicans would not use the Italians for RFK because there was too much heat on American Italian Mafia families by 1968. When Bobby Kennedy looked like he was going to Beat Nixon, they became concerned. Richard Nixon, associated with the Corsicans via Henry Cabot Lodge, his running mate in 1959. The CIA man working with Henry Cabot Lodge was a French Foreign Legion, Corsican in Vietnam since 1940. He watched all his friends die is Dien Bien Phu, Lucian Conein. Conein was quoted as having said the he would have set RFK up better.
Who killed RFK? Sirhan Sirhan is on record and seems to barely be able to remember, the event. Sirhan Sirhan was trying to become a professional jockey in Corona, CA when he was 20. Eddie came to America with $7, but was an equestrian. Equestrians have boat loads of money and are the most connected, private people in the world. It is a world beyond yachting and golf. It is mega money. Eddie probably had access to drugs early on through these people. He was talking about China White in 1981, but his first connections had to be French Corsicans and it was dope from Turkey and then Indochina. That’s all there was in 1967 unless you bought it from an Italian who bought it from a Corsican source. Asia did not get back into the US market for a while.
The Middle East had been working with the French since Paul Carbone was in Egypt 1909. If RFK was going to pull out of Vietnam, he was going to spoil a super mega business that these people had been cultivating all their lives. Ellsworth Bunker had just arrived in Vietnam late 1967. This is a sugar refinery specialist. His family dates back to Sugar cane out of Cuba since the 1800’s. Bunker’s family was thrown out of Cuba just like Santo Trafficante Jr. It was time to get back.
I think the there is a chance Eddie Nash has a blood oath with Sirhan Sirhan. They were both Christians from Palestine, equestrians and Sirhan Sirhan mentions “a whole community” who was offended by RFK’s support for Israel in taped interviews. Sirhan Sirhan had a head injury and was taking drugs during this period. This is yet another compromising position SIrhan Sirhan is in possibly with Eddie Nash. That day June 6th 1968 was a confusing day at a hotel with RFK it was hectic. Eddie Nash’s family owned 48 hotels in Palestine. He knows hotels. I think Eddie got the contract from the Corsicans and he already had a compromised Sirhan Sirhan, who would never talk because he made a middle eastern type blood oath. Palestinians would wire money around the world to people in desperate situations. 1968 was a turbulent year in Palestine, but the Corsicans knew Nixon would not withdraw from Vietnam even though he was campaigning on stopping the war. They needed Nixon in the presidency in 1968 or their billion dollar business was going to fall as it eventually did. The Corsicans had moved to Latin America by 1972 because they knew it was about to fall. Eddie Nash told Sirhan Sirhan what to do. Shoot bullets everywhere and that is what he did. Eddie Nash was going to make his bones and he dressed like a cop and hit RFK at point blank range. He became huge enough to sink his drug money into clubs.
Eddie Nash did not explode in the early 1970’s with a hot dog truck. Eddie Nash is one of the most violent and sinister people of human history. The reason why his family got killed was because that a Hells Angel was scared to death of Eddie. He was praying to God that Eddie was in there because he was frightened of Eddie Nash. If he was that scary at age 55, I am sure he was violent enough at age 39. I think Eddie Nash knew how to position Sirhan Sirhan and plan a hotel murder.
The question to the crowd is: When did Eddie start dealing drugs? Before 1967? How long was his drug money accumulating before he opened his first club? The RFK hit for the Corsicans would make him big time in the drug game. How big was Eddie Nash? Was he dealing with the Corsicans in the early 1960’s. No hot dog truck business did this. This man had a serious Hells Angel trying to murder Eddie for fear of his own life. These murders on Wonderland was only a snap shot of how violent Eddie Nash really was. The John Holmes “Black Book” story sounds like the guy I am profiling for the RFK Assassination. Eddie Nash fits the profile for the RFK Assassination June 6th 1968. Anyone have any knowledge of Eddie getting a drug pinch or a drug connection dating back to 1967? If he was dealing drugs, there is a good chance his first money came from heroin from the Corsicans. He may have had his own connection. The Corsicans were branching out at this very moment because the US Ambassador to Vietnam 1967 Ellsworth Bunker was mass producing heroin in Vietnam. Massive increase on production in 1968. The Corsicans were not going to allow Vietnam to close, Turkey was dead and the Middle East was not developed for production yet. They had to kill RFK. The Corsican Mafia killed JFK and RFK for the same exact reason. They didn’t have to kill Sirhan Sirhan like Lee Harvey Oswald, there must have been a middle eastern blood oath. Can anyone tell me what a blood oath in the middle east during this time period was like? How serious was a Middle Eastern Blood Oath during the 1950′-1970’s?
Char, 
Murmillo, and 2 others are discussing. 
bobabooie, 
Darcymarie, 
Bonnie Brae is discussing. 
James historiographer, 
J.P. McPickleshitter, 
John 12:34 pm on April 19, 2013 Permalink |
During his trial, Holmes’ defense of being “the man in the middle” and under duress, would later be written in as a new defense in many law school textbooks. The same goes for the smuggling case of Ron Launius in 1974, but his case had to do with Double Jeopardy sentencing guidelines, etc. Ron’s case versus the US government has been cited by no less than 22 other legal cases over the years.
localarts 8:49 pm on April 19, 2013 Permalink |
I truly wish Coen could have gotten a conviction. Holmes would have rolled over on Eddie for sure being the shit weasel that he was. I guess that was too much to ask for though.
John W 8:59 pm on April 19, 2013 Permalink |
Me too. It’s a tough ride, Holmes would have rolled. You were right the whole time.. The gang also had Sac town obligations and court dates for petty crimes.
Murmillo 12:10 pm on April 21, 2013 Permalink |
Hello!
Do you know why Ron Launius changed that way? It seems that in the beginning he was living a conservative lifestyle. Didn’t he get along with his life in the military or did he get troubles after leaving the military?
And is it true what internet sources say that he went to the Mexican border to deal drugs for bikers, then his girlfriend was kidnapped and when he got her back he wiped out all of the dealers?
Is it known how many people he killed in total?
John 5:12 pm on April 21, 2013 Permalink |
Not certain about the kidnapping stuff. I have not been able to confirm those stories. But… he had a good tour in the Air Force, serving almost 10 years with an honorable discharge from the service. I think that after the military and getting married, he just go disgruntled, worked a few dead end jobs and then go into drugs and easy money. He got busted smuggling drugs from Mexico and served his prison time. It was all downhill, so to speak, from there.
Char 12:13 pm on February 8, 2021 Permalink |
The movie American Gangster had pilot’s putting drugs into the corpses as Ron did if u seen that movie