Here’s a crazy story that seems to have slipped under the local radar. Pictured is Juliana Redding, a 21-year-old model/aspiring actress who was found murdered in her apartment in ritzy Santa Monica, CA more than two years ago. A former Tucson resident, Redding’s story probably would have been bigger news locally if the Old Pueblo still had a functioning newspaper. Now, however, the case is back in the headlines as the woman arrested in her murder has been linked to a disgruntled business associate of Redding’s father in a potential murder-for-hire plot.

Earlier this month, Kelly Soo Park (Pictured), 44 and her roommate, Ronnie Wayne Case, 34, were arrested in Redding’s murder. Although Case has yet to be charged, prosecutors revealed over the weekend that Park received more than $360,000 from a business associate of Juliana’s father, Greg Redding, in multiple payments right before and after the murder.

According to the LA Times, “Park was paid $250,000 three weeks before the grisly 2008 killing of Juliana Redding and Park’s family received another payment of $113,400 in the days before her arrest June 18.”

So who paid Park? Her employer, Dr. Munir Uwaydah, a Southern California doctor with a checkered past, including a 2005 conviction for defrauding a medical supply company of nearly $1 million, who’s currently being investigated for allegedly filing millions more in fraudulent insurance claims.

According to police, Greg Redding, was “involved in a business negotiation with Dr. Uwaydah that fell apart … five days before the murder charged in this case,” Santa Monica Det. Karen Thompson, the investigating officer in the case, wrote in the bail motion. Thompson said Park was suspected of being involved in “medical fraud.” In previous court filings, prosecutors reiterated Park’s involvement in “ongoing, complex, multi-layer medical fraud” and said they were aware that the Berkshire Hathaway Insurance Co. was withholding “several million dollars in payment on medical claims” submitted from Uwaydah’s medical practice.

Wow! A judge should be ruling on the prosecution’s claims and set bail for the defendant in the next few days, so stay tuned for updates.

[LA Times]

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