LAS VEGAS — The judge presiding over Margaret Rudin's murder trial chastised a defense lawyer Tuesday for trying to introduce a series of legal documents that the judge doubts has anything to do with the killing of Rudin's millionaire husband.

Clark County District Court Judge Joseph Bonaventure excused the 12-member jury just 20 minutes into the day's proceedings to give the prosecution time to review documents pertaining to Lee Canyon, a major real estate deal that Rudin's defense believes played a role in Ron Rudin's disappearance and murder in December 1994.

Defense lawyer Michael Amador tried to introduce numerous documents pertaining to the Lee Canyon project during his cross-examination of Patricia Brown, the lawyer for Ron Rudin's trust from 1980 to 1995.

"I'm confused and I imagine the jury is confused with all these documents," said Bonaventure, who has expressed increasing frustration with the pace of the trial, now in its third week. "This doesn't seem like a murder trial to me. It seems like a civil or tax trial."

Bonaventure admonished Amador, who is representing the 57-year-old former Las Vegas socialite pro bono, for not marking proposed exhibits early in the day so that prosecutors Gary Guymon and Chris Owens can review them.

"You don't come in early. You're outside doing interviews," Bonaventure told Amador, referring to a line of television trucks parked outside the Clark County Courthouse.

The defense maintains that the Lee Canyon documents and records pertaining to Ron Rudin's trust are important because they help prove that the victim's business associates had motives to kill Rudin or have him killed. There has already been testimony that Rudin tried to inflate the market value to the Lee Canyon properties by employing creative, if not illegal, paper ownership transfers.

Brown testified this morning that she did not know much about the Lee Canyon project, but said on the stand Monday afternoon that she was deeply involved in the administration of Rudin's trust before and immediately after he died. Margaret Rudin, who smiled when Brown identified her in the courtroom, was written in and out of the trust as a beneficiary several times between May 1988 and November 1993.

According to Brown, Margaret Rudin stood to inherit 60 percent of her fifth husband's estate. She only got $600,000, however, because of a settlement she reached in 1997 to end litigation and pay off mounting legal bills.

Under questioning from the prosecution Monday, Brown said that Ron Rudin asked her in March 1991 to draft a secret directive ordering trustees of the estate to take extraordinary measures to keep his money from anyone involved in his death. Initially, Rudin wanted to name Margaret Rudin specifically but later directed Brown not to name her for fear that disclosure of the directive upon his death would hurt her should he die of natural causes, Brown said.

She testified that Ron Rudin loved his wife but complained that she could also be "vicious and violent" at times.

"He indicated that his wife had made some violent overtures toward some of his employees and he was getting quite concerned about his own welfare," said Brown, who often looked directly at jurors as she testified.

Brown also testified Monday that Rudin's share of her husband's multimillion-dollar estate waxed and waned several times during their seven-year marriage. Ron Rudin added his new wife as a 50-percent beneficiary in May 1988, according to Brown. Rudin deleted Margaret Rudin from the trust entirely in September 1988 but restored her with a 40-percent stake in 1990. For tax purposes, Margaret Rudin's share was increased to 60 percent in 1993.

Asked about the secret directive, Brown said under questioning from Amador that the directive was basically made moot in 1992 when Rudin rewrote his entire trust. He never specifically reactivated the directive, which sat in a vault apart from the original trust papers, Brown said.

By pointing out that the directive was not legally binding, the defense hopes to take a little air out of the prosecution's balloon. During opening statements in late February, prosecutors said they would prove that Margaret Rudin had the motive, means and opportunity to kill her philandering husband and live on the more than $6 million she stood to inherit.

In addition to establishing that Ron Rudin thought his wife capable of murder, prosecutors called Brown to testify about Margaret Rudin's great interest in the administration of his trust during the 33 days between his disappearance and the discovery of his charred, decapitated body near Lake Mohave. Rudin had been shot at least four times in the head with a .22-caliber handgun.

Testifying Tuesday afternoon, Las Vegas police crime scene analyst Monty Spoor said there was no blood detected in Ron Rudin's black Cadillac, which was found parked and locked behind a strip club four days after the businessman disappeared. Fingerprints were lifted from the interior of the dirty vehicle, but they were not compared to any known prints, Spoor said.

No firearms were found, but police recovered three sets of keys, a pair of sunglasses and a man's jacket, long-sleeved shirt and slacks, Spoor said.

Also called to the stand in the afternoon was Maria Flores, who cleaned the Rudin's two-bedroom home every other Tuesday from August 1992 to January 1995.

Aided by a Spanish interpreter, Flores said that she regularly washed bloody handkerchiefs that she found in the master bathroom of the house. The blood on the handkerchiefs seemed to indicate that someone suffered from nosebleeds, Flores said during questioning by Guymon, the prosecutor.

Flores also testified that the Rudin's beige master bedroom rug was replaced by a blue one at some time between Ron Rudin's disappearance and the discovery of his body. An upcoming witness, Augustine Lovato, is expected to testify that he removed beige carpet with a dark stain and foul odor at Margaret Rudin's direction.

Prosecutors will argue that the stain was Ron Rudin's blood and that Margaret Rudin redecorated the master bedroom in an attempt to cover up the killing. Flores and two Las Vegas police detectives, however, testified today that they were in the house within days of the victim's disappearance and did not notice any major stains or smell any foul odor.

Guymon encountered a bit of difficulty with Flores, his witness, when she made statements about occasionally having to clean blood on master bedroom sheets. No such testimony was offered during the 1997 grand jury proceeding that led to Rudin's indictment.

Guymon asked Flores if she liked Margaret Rudin so much that she would not want to see her get into any trouble.

"I think she was a good wife. It's sad to see her in the situation she is in," Flores responded.