1 week Ago By Brandon Cruz
A NEW documentary, The Wonderland Murders, is set to make its highly anticipated debut on MGM+. The four-part docuseries will premier on September 8 and delve deep into the brutal 1981 murders of four people in Los Angeles — a crime that shocked the nation . The case was never solved and has since forever etched itself into Hollywood's dark history .
The story involves an infamous cast of characters , including John C. Holmes - one of the most recognizable figures in the adult entertainment industry at the time. Holmes rose to fame in the 1970s as the star of over 500 adult films.
However, he also became embroiled in one of the bloodiest murder cases in US history during the Wonderland murders. Read More News The murders were named after the street where the killings occurred and became the inspiration for several films over the years, including Boogie Nights and Wonderland. But now, for the first time, audiences will get a detailed, firsthand look at the crime through archival footage, interviews, and chilling never-before-heard retellings of the events surrounding the murders.
Holmes, whose off-screen persona was as controversial as his on-screen performances, was at the height of his fame in the 1970s. Known for his notorious role as Johnny Wadd and abnormally large penis, Holmes was rumored to have slept with over 14,000 women and was paid up to $1,000 per scene during his two-decade-long career in porn. Most read in The US Sun However, his life took a dark turn, leading him to a descent into drug addiction , crime , and eventually, the gruesome murders.
By the early 1980s, Holmes had become deeply addicted to freebasing cocaine, a habit that eroded his once-thriving career by inducing impotence and erectile dysfunction. With his film roles dwindling and his drug addiction spiraling out of control, Holmes turned to petty theft to fund his habit. His criminal entanglements led him into the orbit of the Wonderland Gang, a notorious group of Los Angeles drug dealers who ran a lucrative cocaine operation out of a house on Wonderland Avenue.
It is rumored that the Wonderland Gang was one of the most powerful criminal organizations in the Southern California underworld, controlling much of the cocaine trade within the city. The Wonderland Murders docuseries explores Holmes' connection to this gang and his role in the violent robbery of Eddie Nash, a powerful nightclub owner and drug kingpin associated with the criminal group, just days before the murders. Holmes, who had become indebted to the gang's leader, Ron Launius, was forced to participate in the plot to rob Nash of drugs, cash, and valuables from his home.
"He was part of the gang and not part of the gang," Mike Sager, who wrote extensively about John and the Wonderland Murders, told The US Sun. "At the beginning, the people accepted him because he was a celebrity but after a while, they realized he was just a junkie too." "They probably told him ‘You’re doing our drugs but not contributing anything so what are you going to contribute?’ So, he had to come up with a caper and the best person he knew was Eddie Nash.
" Holmes helped hatch a plan to raid Nash's house clean of any drugs and money. He was tasked with going over and leaving the back sliding door open, so the gang could sneak in at night and rob Nash. On June 29, 1981, they entered Nash's home via the unlocked door, held his bodyguard at gunpoint, and stole his stash of drugs, jewelry, and hundreds of thousands of dollars.
They even robbed a floor safe that Nash kept under his bed, which very few knew existed. This made Nash suspect John immediately since he was one of the few who knew of the safe. The drug lord was held hostage and made to beg for his life, something he later recalled as "humiliating".
For the robbery, Holmes had gotten the "largest pile of cocaine" he had ever seen. But the aftermath of the plan went horribly wrong when Nash figured out Holmes was behind the robbery. In retaliation, Nash ordered a full-blown hit on the Wonderland Gang.
Ron Launius, Billy Deverell, Joy Audrey Gold Miller, and Barbara Richardson would later be found bludgeoned to death, while Susan Launius, Ron's wife, was critically injured but survived. Investigators said the scene was overwhelmingly brutal, noting it was bloodier than the Tate-LaBianca murders committed by members of the Manson Family in 1969. Holmes, who had left his fingerprint at the crime scene, was arrested and charged with four counts of murder, though he would later be acquitted.
Dawn Schiller, who was Holmes’ teenage girlfriend during this time, recalled the horrifying abuse she endured at his hands and Holmes' demeanor the day of the murders. Holmes, in a desperate attempt to fuel his addiction, would even pimp out Schiller to Eddie Nash in exchange for drugs. "He got back.
We didn’t say anything. He looked exhausted," Schiller said. "He took a couple of valiums and laid down and went to sleep.
He tossed and turned, and he screamed and screamed ‘blood, blood, there’s so much blood’." "That was the final gut-stabber for me," she said. John returned to porn and continued acting up until his death from AIDS on March 13, 1988.
The Wonderland Murders remain a cold case to this day and though John didn't cooperate with police, he did confess to one person - his wife Sharon. Read More on The US Sun Though Holmes was acquitted of the murders, he would later die of AIDS in 1988, taking many of the secrets of that night with him to the grave. Despite the passage of time, the Wonderland Murders case remains open, and many questions remain unanswered.
.
