Man held as suspect
WASHINGTON (AP) - A man sought in the slayings of five relatives once tried to reach the home of singer Olivia Newton-John, and the name Olivia was found on a sheet of paper bearing the names of the victims, officials sау.
Security has been increased at Newton-John’s home in California and at the mental hospital where the man’s sister is a patient, said Police Chief Jimmy R. Boudreaux of Lake Arthur.
The Lafayette Parish sheriff’s office said Wednesday that a search using helicopters, dogs and horses had failed to turn up any sign of Michael O. Perry. 28. Deputies said the hunt was triggered by a call from someone who said he knew Perry and had seen him changing clothes at a truck stop.
Perry has been charged in a district attorney’s warrant with five counts of first-degree murder in the shooting deaths of his father, Chester, 48, his mother, Grace; his cousins Randy Perry, 19, and Bryan LeBlanc, 22; and his nephew Anthony Bonin, 2.
The bodies were found in two Lake Arthur resi dences July 19.
The name “Olivia” and the name of Perry’s sister were written on a sheet of paper found at the scene and the only other names on the paper were those of the five victims, said Boudreaux. He said Perry had gone to Newton-John’s home in April, but was turned away at the gate by a security guard.
Boudreaux toid the Jennings Daily News Perry wrote two fan letters to Newton-John last year which revealed he believed the singer and actress was a Muse trapped beneath Lake Arthur.
Boudreaux said he got the letters from Gavin de Becker Inc., a Los Angeles firin that specializes in providing security for celebrities, the newspaper reported Tuesday.
Newton-John played a Muse In Greek mythology, one of the nine goddesses of the arts in the movie “Xanadu,” and Perry wrote he saw that movie. “I know much about Apollo and the nine Muses, as I said, I saw Xanadu for the first time the past months gone by,” wrote Perry.
In the second letter, Perry said he wrote it with four different pens because there are four rivers leading from paradise.
Part of one letter was written on the back of expense vouchers for Fluor Drilling Co., the company for which Perry’s father worked.
Perry lived in a trailer parked behind his parents’ home in Lake Arthur. He told Newton-John he felt there was an “underground network operating” under his traller and his parents’ home.
“I heard voices and the voices said to me that you are a Muse trapped under Lake Arthur,” he wrote.
Miss Newton-John played a Muse in the movie “Xanadu.” A muse was any one of nine goddesses of the arts in Greek mythology.