Rock Hudson Case Lawyer 1 of 3 Air Crash Victims

A prominent Los Angeles lawyer who represented celebrities and recently won a landmark, $21-million award for Marc Christian against the estate of Rock Hudson was identified Friday as one of three people killed in a plane crash a day earlier in Santa Clarita.

Harold Rhoden, 66, of Northridge was killed with his wife, Sheila, 40, and his mother-in-law, Ceil Rauch, 61, of Lake Worth, Fla., said Los Angeles County coroner’s spokesman Robert Dambacher. Rhoden’s daughter, Lorraine, 13, who was also in the aircraft, was reported in critical condition at Henry Mayo Newhall Hospital in Valencia.

Rhoden, who had practiced law in Los Angeles since 1952, was piloting the single-engine, four-seat Trinidad TB-21 that went down after it apparently developed engine trouble and struck some power lines.

In recent years, his clients included Christian, who was awarded $21.75 million from the late actor’s estate earlier this year. A jury had found that Hudson and his personal secretary were negligent because they hid the actor’s AIDS from Christian, Hudson’s homosexual lover.

In April, a judge slashed the award to $5.5 million, but attorneys for Hudson’s estate have appealed. Robert Parker Mills, an attorney for the estate, said Friday that he did not know how Rhoden’s death will affect the case. Both sides were in the process of filing their opening briefs, and no oral arguments had been scheduled, he said.

Investigating Crash

Investigators for the National Transportation Safety Board and the Federal Aviation Administration were investigating the cause of the crash, which occurred about 2:10 p.m. Thursday in a ravine near Sierra Highway in Santa Clarita, officials said.

According to witnesses, “as he was going down, the tail of the airplane clipped a high-voltage wire which caused him to nose-dive down into the ground,” Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Sgt. David Stunson said.

Minutes earlier, Rhoden had spoken twice by radio with air traffic controllers at Van Nuys Airport, his destination on a flight from Sacramento, Van Nuys Airport spokesman Bob Hayes said. Rhoden reported having engine trouble and asked for directions to a closer airport before the crash, Hayes said.

Rhoden’s secretary said she did not know precisely why her boss was in Sacramento, saying she knew only that the trip “had something to do with the plane” and “had nothing to do with law.” Rhoden’s family had gone along for the weekend, secretary Tip Phillips said.

Phillips said Rhoden left for Sacramento June 16 and had intended to return two or three days later, but on Monday, he phoned to say “he was detained; he had engine trouble.”

Licensed Pilot

Rhoden, a licensed pilot since 1947, called Phillips again Thursday morning to report that the problem had been fixed and that he was returning to Los Angeles, Phillips said.

“We didn’t really go into what was wrong with the plane,” Phillips said. “He just complained about it and made a few jokes” about the problem, she said.

NTSB investigators could not be reached for comment Friday.

Rhoden’s career included several high-profile cases. He was a close associate of celebrity divorce lawyer Marvin Mitchelson, who said he worked with Rhoden on at least 50 cases in the last 30 years.

Rhoden and Mitchelson repre sented Bianca Jagger in her 1979 divorce from rock star Mick Jagger. The duo also represented the wife of international arms merchant and Iran-Contra figure Adnan Khashoggi in a 1982 divorce.

Last month, Rhoden represented Mitchelson when a jury cleared the lawyer of charges in a $6.5-million civil suit filed by a former Mitchelson client who accused him of rape.

“I would describe him as a lawyer’s lawyer,” a tearful Mitchelson said of Rhoden. “He was absolutely erudite . . . knew the law, in all the time I had seen him, better than his opponents and much of the time better than the judge.”

Mitchelson said he introduced Rhoden to his second wife, Sheila.

‘Fine Gentleman’

“His most outstanding quality was that he was a very fine gentleman,” said Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Bruce R. Geernaert, who presided over the Hudson case. “The jurors liked him very much. . . . Mr. Rhoden was very, very calm and cool.”

Mills, who opposed Rhoden in the case, described him as “a hard-nosed bulldog.” He said Rhoden “chose to try this case all the way through . . . even if it might mean that they could get less money at some point in the future.”

Rhoden also played a prominent role in a contest over the estate of Howard Hughes. One of Hughes’ associates designated Rhoden as the substitute executor of a handwritten will that named a gas station attendant, Melvin Dummar, among the beneficiaries and that was contested by four Hughes cousins not named in the will.

Rhoden spent two years trying to prove the authenticity of the will, but a jury ruled in 1978 that the document was a fake.

Lengthy Battle

In the 1960s, Rhoden waged a lengthy legal battle against Litton Industries on behalf of a man who claimed a founding interest in the company. He won a $7.5-million award for his client in 1965. During the course of the case, Litton filed a $40-million libel suit against Rhoden and others, but the suit was later dismissed.

Rhoden served in World War II as a tail gunner on a B-24 bomber and was a prisoner of war in Germany after the plane crashed in Austria, Phillips said.