San Francisco Blog

Russell Manning

​San Francisco art dealer Russell Manning, 67, has pleaded not guilty to murder and other charges related a to the December killing of a Palm Springs collector. He is the sixth suspect charged in the so-called gay grifter murder, in which a group of sex-partner-swapping alleged con men attempted to loot the assets of Clifford Lambert, 74.

Manning had been held in a Guadalajara-area prison on unrelated charges prior to his arrest by Palm Springs police last week. Police had not told ace City News Service reporter Jessica Davis whether Manning was extradited from Mexico.

Davis did, however, provide a deft rundown of the Gay Grifter murder robbery scheme allegedly carried out in Palm Springs by a band of some-time friends and lovers from San Francisco.

Palm Springs Police have now filed murder and theft charges against apparent ringleader Kaushal Niroula, 27; his lover San Francisco lawyer David Replogle, 60; his other sometime lover Daniel Garcia, 26; and a pair of alleged S.F. hitmen: barkeep Miguel Bustamante, 26 and former Marine Craig McCarthy, 29.

McCarthy, who was arrested in San Francisco July 17, allegedly held Lambert while Bustamante knifed him to death, then cleaned up the blood and helped Bustamante and Niroula dispose of the body.

Investigators are not saying whether they have found the victim's remains.

The six purportedly planned and carried out the Dec. 5 murder, then looted Lambert's residence, emptied his bank accounts, and tried to enlist the help of Bay Area professionals Niroula had befriended to sell Lambert's $1 million house for $300,000.

Manning is accused of transferring the victim's money out of one of his bank accounts several days after the retiree was reported missing, Davis reported.

Replogle allegedly forged a signature on a power of attorney document used by some of his co-defendants to fraudulently sell the victim's home, and Garcia was caught with Lambert's debit card when he tried to withdraw money from one of the retiree's accounts on several occasions, Davis reported.

At the time of Lambert's murder, both Manning and Niroula had been free on bail after they had been arrested for a different confidence scam involving a fraudulent artwork sale.

In the that scheme, Manning helped Niroula convince a Silicon Valley art collector that he was able to broker the sale of a painting hanging in a Scottish art museum. Niroula allegedly claimed the British royal family wanted to get rid of the painting because it had been obtained from the German Nazi government, which stole troves of artwork from Jews. The painting story was a ruse, and Niroula allegedly made off with $485,000 in payments. He quickly spent $250,000 of the money on a Las Vegas gambling spree, according to police.