‘Dead girls don’t talk’: Alleged rapist left drugged L.A. women to die, witness testifies
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Michael Ansbach said he had been snorting cocaine with David Pearce for hours, but he knew something was wrong with the last bump he took.
After a day spent filming material for a documentary Pearce was supposedly producing, the pair went out to a Koreatown nightclub, then an East L.A. warehouse rave, where Ansbach said they met two young women — Christy Giles and Hilda Marcela Cabrales Arzola.
The two women later died from drug overdoses, with Pearce now standing trial, charged with murder in their deaths, along with several rapes prosecutors say he committed between 2007 and 2021.
Ansbach testified Friday that Pearce was generously doling out coke to the women, and that the group eventually made their way back to Pearce’s Olympic Boulevard apartment.
At some point, Ansbach testified, Pearce served him a vodka drink that tasted “awful” and made him feel “immediately dizzy.” Then, he said, Pearce brought out a batch of coke he deemed “the good stuff,” according to Ansbach. He said he joined Giles and Arzola in trying the new supply, but in an instant, his nostrils were burning and he was in serious pain.
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Ansbach said he asked Pearce what he just snorted. In reply, Ansbach said, Pearce began laughing and looked like “the devil personified right in front of me.”
Hours passed. Ansbach said he lost count of how many times he vomited. He noticed neither woman was moving and that Giles “didn’t appear to be alive.” Ansbach says he pleaded with Pearce to take the women to the hospital but was brushed off.
“’Dead girls don’t talk,’” Pearce said, according to Ansbach’s testimony Friday. “It’s a phrase that echoes in my nightmares and disturbs me.”
Pearce has pleaded not guilty, with his defense arguing that there’s no evidence he supplied the drugs that caused the women to die.
Originally arrested in connection with the killings of both women — who were dumped outside hospitals that night in November 2021 — Ansbach has since become a critical prosecution witness, the only person to survive after ingesting the drugs prosecutors say killed Giles and Arzola.
Pearce faces two counts of murder in the deaths of the women and seven counts of rape. Prosecutors previously declined to pursue sexual assault charges against Pearce in 2014, but after news of Giles’ and Arzola’s deaths drew headlines, several women came forward with accusations that dated back to 2005.
Prosecutors said during opening arguments last week that Pearce represented himself as a well-connected Hollywood player to lure women back to his apartment. In some cases, the women alleged they fell ill or felt “paralyzed” after Pearce served them drinks, and woke up to him sexually assaulting them.
Brandt Osborn, who was Pearce’s roommate at the apartment where Giles and Arzola suffered the overdoses, is also on trial for two counts of being an accessory after the fact to the women’s deaths. Prosecutors said Osborn helped Pearce transport the dying women and destroy evidence at the residence.
Ansbach said he lost track of time as he got sicker in the apartment, but insisted that he urged Pearce to take the women to a hospital.
“I felt incredibly weak … like it was taking over me … it was like a tranquilizer,” Ansbach said of his reaction to the drink Pearce served him. A toxicology screen found gamma-hydroxybutyrate — the date rape drug commonly referred to as GHB — in Giles’ system.
After checking Giles’ pulse — Ansbach said he couldn’t feel anything — he became concerned that Pearce wasn’t going to do anything to help the women.
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Ansbach said Pearce was “really only concerned about himself,” and mentioned his fear of prison time due to a past criminal record.
“I’ve had priors, this can’t happen to me,” Pearce said, according to Ansbach.
Court records show the women were eventually taken to medical facilities nearly 12 hours later, driven in a car without license plates, which Ansbach said he saw Pearce remove.
Pearce and Osborn have denied all wrongdoing, and their attorneys were quick to point out Ansbach’s description of events inside the apartment changed significantly after his arrest in December 2021.
Prosecutors did not offer Ansbach immunity in exchange for his testimony. Months after his arrest alongside Pearce and Osborn, he provided a statement through an attorney implicating the other men.
Ansbach was never charged with a crime, and it was not immediately clear if the LAPD ever presented a case against him. The district attorney’s office has not responded to inquiries about the case, including a request for public records that layout the reasoning as to why any charges might have been declined.
On cross-examination, Ansbach admitted that during his first interview with Los Angeles police he said he never saw the women do drugs, nor did he paint a portrait of Pearce anywhere close to the way he described him on Friday.
Ansbach said he didn’t have a lawyer at the time and was rattled after being taken in by what he described as a “SWAT team.”
“I was scared,” Ansbach said. “I’d never been in that situation before, and I had no idea what to do.”
“So you lied?” Voll asked.
“Yeah,” Ansbach eventually said.
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