The True Crime Kitchen

October 30th 1968, The Hollywood Hills

Tucked away from the bustle of Hollywood, a lone man putzes around his home. His phone rings, providing a welcome distraction. The caller offers the man some company. It’s the kind of company one pays for. As a frequent client of escort services, the man accepted the offer, and readied himself for guests. Unfortunately, the evening would not go as envisioned by either the man or the caller. Later that afternoon, his two guests, dropped off by a friend, approached the man’s modest home and knocked on the door. He opened it, and graciously welcomed his future killers inside.

The man, like many others rattling around in Hollywood homes, was an aging actor whose star had dimmed. In the 1920’s he was a suave, romantic lead in silent pictures. It was a successful career that continued into the talking pictures of the 1930s. At his career peak, the man, “The Latin Lover”, was making $100k a picture, locking lips with the most famous actresses in the world: Norma Shearer, Myrna Loy, Joan Crawford, and Greta Garbo. His co-stars praised his acting skills, though he never won an Oscar. Friends would refer to him as a kind and gentle soul. Women admired his romantic on-screen persona and good looks. But his heyday of leading roles and an adoring public was long gone. His last leading role had been in 1934. His career decline was swift, exacerbated by poor studio choices and his alcoholism. Despite the permanent career slump, relegated to only picking up the occasional bit part on television shows like Bonanza, he had made good real estate investments, so he lived comfortably. He even had a private secretary. Granted, this secretary mostly just wrote checks to the sex workers (“hustlers”, as the male pros were called), and picked up the man’s booze orders. But hey, a living is a living. He also had a memoir in the works: attempting to capture the fascinating stories from his time as a star at MGM (being the first Latin American film star ever). But it would never come to be. When the secretary arrived for work that Halloween morning, he discovered the home had been ransacked and, more unfortunately, that his employer had been murdered. The press jumped on the story: Headlines on the front page in LA and NYC reading “Ramon Novarro, Silent Film Era Star, Beaten to Death”.

Ramon was found nude, bound with electrical cords, and dead in his own bed. Police quickly set about investigating the crime. Unfortunately, while his killers would be identified, secrets would be revealed that Ramon had spent decades hiding. You remember the memoir he was writing? He had no intention to ever see it line shelves. If it ever was released, it was to be posthumous. You see, Ramon Novarro was gay. He was out in certain Hollywood circles, only where he was safe. But Ramon, far from the first or the last actor in his position as a heterosexual Romeo, needed his sexuality to remain hidden from the public for the sake of his career. Plus, there’s the fact that homosexual relationships, by way of sodomy laws, were still illegal in California until 1976. His romantic relationships had always been clandestine affairs. Ramon’s physique had aged well before its time from alcohol abuse, asthma, and severe emphy­sema, so his brief rendezvous with sex workers was his only outlet. Ramon was also Catholic. Rigidly so. The inner turmoil and religious shame he felt led him to drink to excess, unable to reconcile his faith with his sexuality. Studios often arranged lavender marriages for their gay stars; anything to keep the public image conventional. But unlike other gay and lesbian actors, Ramon shunned the idea, and never married. Given that Ramon was once a star in Hollywood, whose past press (some even written by his secret long-term former partner) revered him as a deeply religious man who had taken care of his large family from Mexico, the scandalous revelations of homosexuality, sex workers, and his brutal death would forever eclipse his film career. The privacy and dignity that Ramon had spent a lifetime maintaining would be stripped from him, and the line between fact and fiction blurred.

Tracing the killers was embarrassingly easy. In the first 24 hours, the police already knew that, in the last 6 months alone, Novarro (or his secretary) had written out more than 100 checks for “gardening” services. His secretary also stopped by the night before, around 5:30 pm, to drop off an order of cigarettes. Ramon didn’t smoke. Since Ramon had trimmed his facial hair and was wearing a fragrant lotion, it was clear to the secretary that Ramon had company, and he wasn’t welcome to linger. In addition to a message on the mirror reading “US GIRLS ARE BETTER THAN FAGITS”, the killers were kind enough to scribble the name “Larry” on the bed sheet, unconvincingly staged to appear as if Ramon, (his hands bound behind his back), had done it. Conversations with a couple hustlers linked to the checks lead the cops to a previously paid guest of Ramon’s; a hustler named Larry. Larry was linked by marriage to a pair of men the police wanted to take a closer look at: The Ferguson brothers, Paul, 22, and Tom, 17. Originally from Illinois. Checking Ramon’s phone records, police discovered a forty eight minute call had been made to a young girl in Chicago the night he died. She said her boyfriend, Tom Ferguson, was the caller. He’d told her he was hanging out in a movie star’s house with his brother Paul, and that they were going to get some money. Like I said, embarrassingly easy.

The police questioned both of the brothers, but only Tom sang like a canary. The brothers heard Ramon had money hidden in the house, and they wanted that cash. Ramon was old, not in good shape, and would be drunk- an easy mark. Ramon greeted his guests wearing a silk robe, served them drinks and chicken gizzards, and even ordered them their preferred brands of cigarettes. The men played piano and listened to records. Ramon read Paul’s palm, predicting a long life, and regaled the brothers with stories of Old Hollywood. As Ramon showed off pictures of his film star past, Tom said he bore no resemblance to his younger self. It was a reminder of how time and booze had affected him. Ramon said that Paul, with a face that one could easily liken to James Dean or Clint Eastwood, could be a superstar. Ramon even called a press agent he was friends with to suggest he meet with Paul. Besides the gizzards, (hard pass on that), it sounded like a fun evening with a lonely actor. Sadly, that bit of camaraderie shared was not enough to stop what happened next.

The autopsy results showed an initial carved on Ramon’s neck, an N or Z. He had lacerations around his face and head. A lead-tipped cane was found on his body, broken and placed on his thighs, and was determined to be the weapon used to beat him. He had a split scalp, and contusions on his neck, chest, left arm, penis, and knees. His official cause of death was “suffocation due to massive bleeding due to fracture of the nose and laceration of the lips and mouth” aka he choked to death on his own blood. Twenty-two strikes, yet none of them were fatal. If Ramon had been on his side or stomach, he would have lived. Time of death was estimated between 9 to 9:30 the night before. During the interrogations, Tom swore it was Paul doing the beating. Funnily enough, Paul said the same thing about Tom. But since both brothers were in the house, they both went to trial.  The thing about autopsy reports is they can tell you the damage, but they can’t tell you who inflicted it. The thing about courtroom testimony is that one can swear under oath, but they can lie anyway to protect themselves or someone else. I said before that Tom sang like a canary, but that canary could be a lyin’ ass bird.

Prosecutors alleged Ramon was beaten, by both brothers, during an interrogation to find his cash stash, rumored to be $5000. The prosecution sought the death penalty. They didn’t believe the brothers intended to kill Ramon, but if a death occurs during a robbery, that’s felony murder. According to his girlfriend, as Tom was on the phone with her, she could hear screaming from the other room. Eventually Tom hung up, joining his brother in Ramon’s room. Ramon, a mere 5’6”, could do little to defend himself against his much younger attackers. Tom, although lanky, was 6’4” and was previously convicted for beating and robbing an elderly man. Paul was shorter than Tom, though not by much at 5’11”, and was stocky, having previously been a boxer. Tom claimed he had helped Ramon into a cold shower to help clean him up. In reality, it was most likely an attempt to rouse the nude and badly battered man who was losing consciousness, so they could continue to torture him. They left Ramon tied up in his bedroom, ransacked the home for the money, and only realized when they came back to the bedroom that he had died. The cash Ramon had in his pocket, 20 or 45 dollars (accounts vary) was the only money they found. Their big steal had been a big bust. 

From the defense there was a lot of victim-shaming homophobia. Both lawyers dehumanized Ramon as “an old queer” who “got what he had coming to him”, a sicko that had invited this fate with his perversion. Both brothers’ lawyers attempted to confuse the jury by pinning the blame on the other brother, hoping to cast enough reasonable doubt as to who did the crime. The jury found both of the men guilty. It was during sentencing that Tom would sing yet another tune. In this version he claimed he alone was the one who killed Ramon. Well actually what he said was “I didn’t kill him. It was my fault that he died.” (Wut?) He claimed a physical assault on Ramon was in response to his sexual advances, continuing the defense team’s tactic of blaming Ramon for his own death because of his sexuality. When asked by the DA if he was lying in an attempt to spare his brother the death penalty, he said “No, I am saying these things because I want to tell the truth and I’d hate to send my brother to the gas chamber for something I did, while I sat in prison like Mr. Cool. He was supposed to get manslaughter and I was supposed to get off. It’s not our fault that we got a dumb jury.”

The brothers may not have considered what they did murder, but the judge disagreed and sentenced them both to life, recommending they never be released. The dangerous killers were locked away, unable to hurt anyone else ever again. A fine ending, right? Wrong. See, there was a little chunk missing from that sentence. The term “Life” is not the same as the term “Life Without Parole”. Both brothers would be paroled in less than 10 years. A pitiful punishment for what they did. The $5k they’d hoped to steal is worth $42k in today’s money. Even split in half, men have killed for less, hoping to change their fortunes. But in this case, there was no money and Ramon’s death was senseless. The trial exposed all his secrets, and slandered his name. The tawdry gossip about the evenings with sex workers made Ramon out to be some kind of sex maniac. The ensuing years did him little favors, as a rumor spread from unscrupulous authors from book to book regarding the “true” murder weapon. It’s crap and I’m not even going to cover it. But the reality is most of those evenings Ramon spent with sex workers weren’t the dirty sexual rodeos the public was imagining. They were for companionship, sharing dinner and listening to Ramon reminisce about his Old Hollywood glory days. A lonely man, getting terribly drunk, and reaching out for some connection, even if he had to pay for it. His family, still so very religious, never spoke of Ramon publicly. In private, they would only say perhaps it was the alcoholism that had made him do such things. Even in death, Ramon couldn’t have the acceptance he yearned for from those he spent decades supporting.

Tom, who spent most of his time in prison getting into trouble and doing drugs like cocaine and glue, would be paroled after just 7 years in 1976. He never saw his brother again. Within a year, he was back in prison. In 1977 he was paroled, finding work in a group home and later a state hospital. He married his prison psychiatrist. She was more than twice his age at 53 and clearly not very professional. Would you be surprised to learn that marriage didn’t work out? Yeah, I didn’t think so. But then again neither did a second marriage. In 1987 he was arrested again, charged with rape. He was given an 8 year sentence, but yet again released early in 1990. That same year he was again arrested after he failed to register as a sex offender. In 1991 he was charged multiple times for things like petty theft, public intoxication, and failure to appear in court. There’s a gap in the journalism here, but Tom was back in prison by 2002 serving a six year sentence. Tom, according to his sister, was never able to get past the Ramon incident. She said it followed him around and he always swore he didn’t even touch the guy. On March 6, 2005, after being released from prison for the umpteenth time- Tom checked into a room at a Motel 6 and slit his throat. No note was found, but it’s not hard to imagine why he chose to end it after a lifetime of being a delinquent dirtbag. 

Paul, who by all accounts was a model inmate, worked as the host of San Quentin’s prison radio station. He also studied sheet metal work, creative writing, and welding. He earned an Associate’s Degree in epistemology in 1974. He entered a prison writing contest with his entry, a short fictional tale about a peace-loving hippie being arrested in Chicago called “Dreams No Dreams”, winning him the $100 first prize. People magazine wrote a little something covering the award. A married woman who saw the write up would eventually leave her husband to marry Paul, though that marriage didn’t last. Paul was paroled in 1978, serving just 9 years for the death of Ramon. He married again and was a fairly successful entrepreneur: He owned a rodeo, a racetrack, a restaurant, and a nightclub. Paul was finally done with parole in 1981. However in 1989 he was arrested and convicted in Missouri for first-degree rape and sodomy after he attacked a woman whose home was near where his car broke down. He was sentenced to 60 years in prison for the rape and sodomy charges, but his sentence was cut in half on appeal.

Paul gave multiple interviews to journalists over the years. In 1998 he finally admitted he had in fact hurt Ramon. Paul claimed it was HIS Catholic guilt that led to the beating. Ah, the Gay Panic defense. Seems a bit strange coming from a man who slept with men for money for years before Ramon’s murder. He said when his brother (despite his age, Tommy was also an alleged hustler and no stranger to mustache kisses himself) saw him kissing Ramon, he felt a tremendous amount of Catholic shame, and punched Ramon a few times. Though why Tom would have entered the bedroom where Paul and Ramon had gone to obviously be intimate casts doubt on this version of the murder in my mind. Paul said there was no intended robbery, so this was just manslaughter after a panic attack. In an interview with Out Magazine in 2012, Paul, then 66, talked about what happened that night. He said Tommy hadn’t done anything to Ramon, it was all him. “…I’m getting drunk. The next thing I knew, I find myself being overwhelmed by this body, and just, like, hairiness, and I guess being kissed or whatever the fuck it was. And I come out of that, I go, ‘Get the fuck–,’ and boom, and I walked out. So, that’s what happened. So of murder I was innocent. Of manslaughter, I wasn’t innocent. Even of manslaughter, maybe you could say I was innocent, but I was guilty of hitting him. I did hit him, but I did it in a drunken stupor…” Paul alleged the lead-tipped cane was never used, only a few of his boxer-strength punches. The level of damage to Ramon’s body doesn’t add up with that explanation, but in this case it wouldn’t be the first lie. He also alleged police planted evidence like the condom in Ramon’s hand. He still denied the robbery angle, saying they just trashed the place to make it look like robbery had been the motive. In a case with so many lies, even 50 years after the crime when there was nothing left to lose by telling the truth, we’ll never know what really happened that night.

In 2018 Paul, his 30 year sentence almost over, was looking forward to his freedom. Then, with the barest of mentions in the local press, news broke that a Missouri inmate named Anthony Graves, 37, was arrested for killing his cellmate in August. It wasn’t until 2020 that Anthony was charged with second degree murder. The murdered cellmate? Paul Ferguson. The exact details of the incident haven’t been released yet, if they ever will be. The medical examiner reported the cause of death as thermal burns and head trauma. Paul’s death, unlike Ramon’s, wasn’t splashed across the front page. Paul remained nameless in some articles, and when he was named it wasn’t accompanied by any notoriety. Fifty years on from that night at Ramon’s, Paul was a forgotten character in an old Hollywood scandal. As his cellmate beat him, I wonder if Paul, by then age 72, felt as helpless as Ramon had all those years ago. Trapped in a room with a killer, unable to fight back against the younger man intent on hurting him, killing him for nothing, did he see the similarities? I like to think he died with his own blood in his throat, getting a taste of karma.

The Eats:

Back in the day celeb recipes, or at least recipes with celeb names slapped on them, were published in all kinds of retro magazines and Hollywood themed cookbooks. Eventually I hope to cover plenty of their dishes. It’ll be part celeb profile, part crime tale if they were murdered, and of course a recipe review if the food is one of their “original” creations. Ramon has three recipes to his name that I’ve found so far. While he may have served his killers chicken gizzards, I sure wouldn’t. Perhaps they’d have been happier with this ever popular appetizer with a twist-

Ramon Novarro’s Guacamole

2 large avocados

2 oz. of Ortega’s diced green chiles, rinsed well

1 lb. seedless grapes*

Salt, oil, and vinegar to taste

Tortilla Chips

1. Peel and mash the avocado until it’s your desired consistency.
2. Stir in the rinsed chiles.
3. The salt, oil, and vinegar are to be added like seasoning a salad aka it’s a personal preference. But a good starting point is ¼ tsp Salt, 1 Tbsp. Oil, and 1 ½ tsp. Vinegar.
4. Add the grapes, stir, and do a little taste test with a tortilla chip to check the flavor balance.
5. Add more salt, oil, and/or vinegar to taste.
6. Serve with Tortilla Chips

*Ramon’s recipe originally used pomegranate seeds but he subbed in grapes to make the recipe more accessible for everyone. But since this is 2025 and not 1945 we can all find pomegranate seeds nowadays. If you want to try the OG version- flavor your guacamole with those crunchy little red jewels instead of grapes. You will definitely not need a pound of them. I’m thinking a single pomegranate or the cup of seeds you can buy pre-done for you (near the chopped fruit) can be added in, to taste, and a fingerful sprinkled on the top for extra color.

I also don’t recommend a whole pound of grapes. As he didn’t specify cutting the grapes at all, one might imagine he was eating them whole. While Ramon may have been out here big grapin’ it, though I suspect he used smaller ones, I highly recommend cutting the grapes into fourths or dicing them for a better eating experience.

This was an unusual recipe…but I didn’t hate it. With the vinegar, plenty of salt, and cutting the grapes up smaller I see them as a substitute for tomatoes, providing some sweetness and moisture. A cup of grapes is probably all you need, chopped after measuring. If you add a little chopped onion and minced jalapeno? This guacamole wouldn’t be much different than any guacamole you’re used to eating. I give it 3/5 stars as written, but it has potential to be a solid 4 star appetizer with some modifications.