Judge in Las Vegas vacates Rudin’s 2001 murder conviction
LAS VEGAS (AP) — A judge has vacated the murder conviction of a 78-year-old Las Vegas woman who spent 20 years in prison for the 1994 killing of her millionaire husband before she was paroled.
Margaret Rudin was found guilty in 2001 of murder in the death of real estate mogul Ron Rudin. Prosecutors said he had been shot in the head as he slept and his body dumped in the desert.
U.S. District Judge Richard Boulware ruled Sunday Margaret Rudin had received ineffective assistance of counsel from her late defense attorney, Michael Amador, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported.
The Clark County district attorney’s office didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment from The Associated Press regarding whether prosecutors were considering appealing or retrying her.
Rudin, who maintained her innocence all along, was paroled in 2020.
“I will be 79 years old at the end of this month so I am very, very grateful,” she told the newspaper Monday.
A socialite antiques shop owner the media later dubbed the “Black Widow,” she was indicted in 1997 in what authorities portrayed as a crime committed for financial gain.
She vanished before she was indicted and spent two years as a fugitive until a tip generated by a “most wanted” TV show led to her arrest in 1999 in Massachusetts.
