A woman whom police describe as a high-end prostitute is under arrest after they say she injected a Silicon Valley tech executive with heroin and then casually left as he lay dying.
Forrest Timothy Hayes, 51, had an “ongoing prostitution relationship” with Alix Catherine Tichleman, 26, when he was found dead November 23 aboard his 50-foot yacht in the Santa Cruz harbor, according to a police statement.
Detectives say security footage from the yacht shows Tichleman, who boasted of over 200 client relationships via a website called “Seeking Arrangements,” injecting Hayes with heroin.
“Rather than provide first aid or call 911, Ms. Tichleman proceeds to gather her belongings including the heroin and needles,” the police statement reads.
Tichleman stepped over Hayes’ body several times while gathering her belongings, at one point stepping over him to finish a glass of wine, police say.
They say the video finally shows her leaving the boat and then reaching back to lower a blind and conceal the victim’s body from outside view.
Tichleman appeared in court in Santa Cruz on Wednesday. She is being charged with manslaughter, administering heroin to another person, administering bodily harm, moving heroin across county lines, possession of heroin and prostitution charges. A public defender asked that her arraignment be postponed until July 16.
Police say they came across Tichleman in the course of investigating the death of Hayes, a Google executive who reports say worked on the Google Glass project, among others.
They say they became concerned that she planned to leave the state, so detectives posing as a potential client lured her to an “upscale location” after arranging a July 4 session for more than $1,000. She was arrested when she arrived.
Google did not return messages seeking comment. Apple, where reports say Hayes previously worked, declined comment.
“I was really devastated when I heard about it,” Todd Zion, who worked at Google for a short time under Hayes, told The San Francisco Chronicle on Wednesday. “He was a great boss. I never had a chance to thank him.”
Tichleman describes herself as a model, makeup artist and writer on what appears to be her Facebook page, on which her name is spelled Tichelman and which says she formerly worked at Larry Flynt’s Hustler Club. It says she studied journalism at Georgia State University in Atlanta.
“It’s really nice to talk with someone about killing sprees and murdering people in cold blood…and they love it too,” a June 28 post on the page reads. “No judgement. Yay! F**k all of that positivity bullsh**. Take a look around you. Life is hard and then you die.”
The profile includes numerous modeling shots of Tichleman, some of them in provocative poses. By midafternoon Wednesday, the page appeared to have been deleted.
The police statement says detectives are looking into a similar death in another state to see whether Tichleman may have been involved
https://www.cnn.com/video/data/2.0/video/topvideos/2014/07/10/newday-simon-google-executive-dead-heroin.cnn.html
