VAN NUYS, Calif. (Court TV) — A California judge refused to dismiss charges against a man accused of killing four sorority sisters, despite the defense’s claims that the prosecution hid evidence.
Fraser Michael Bohm, 24, has pleaded not guilty to four counts of murder and four counts of vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence after a crash killed four students from Pepperdine University.
Fraser Michael Bohm appears at a hearing on July 27, 2026. (Court TV)
Prosecutors have accused Bohm of driving more than 100 miles per hour on the Pacific Coast Highway (PCH) when he lost control of his vehicle, crashing into parked cars and the four victims who were standing on the side of the road. Niamh Rolston, Asha Weir, Deslyn Williams and Peyton Stewart, who were all seniors at Pepperdine University and members of the Alpha Phi sorority, were killed at the scene on Oct. 17, 2023.
Bohm’s attorney, Alan Jackson, appeared in court on Monday and asked Judge Thomas Rubinson to dismiss the four charges of murder, arguing that the law requires the underlying act for the charge to “involve a high degree of probability that somebody is going to die.” Jackson presented 10 years of statistics reflecting collision data, Caltrans reports and police reports that showed chronic speeding on PCH. “The picture those data paint is materially different from the picture that was presented at the hearing,” Jackson said.
Conceding his client was behind the wheel and caused the crash, Jackson argued that speeding alone isn’t enough to bring murder charges — especially when police reports reflect “pervasive and chronic speeding” on PCH and governmental awareness of the problem, Jackson said. “Repeated speeding, repeated collisions and not a single other fatal collision in 10 years on that stretch of road. Not one. And we didn’t have that data to make that point in front of Judge Edward at the preliminary hearing.”
While Jackson argued that prosecutors had improperly withheld the crash data before the preliminary hearing, Rubinson disagreed, saying that the defense had ample opportunity to get the information itself.
“Speed alone is not what the people are arguing,” prosecutor Nathan Bartos responded. “It wasn’t what we argued at the preliminary hearing. We presented witnesses who described the dangerous driving — not just speeding.”
Bartos said that witnesses described Bohm’s BMW as driving erratically before the collision. “It is not speed alone, it is not speed itself, it is not speed in isolation, it’s not speed in a vacuum,” Bartos said. “The facts and circumstances of this case matter. So when discussing the speed coupled with the distraction, coupled with the skidding while accelerating, veering, all these driving patterns, is what we’re talking about in this case.”
Rubinson cited Bohm’s driving before the crash as he denied the defense’s motion, noting that multiple people described Bohm as swerving and veering across lanes, and that the car’s airbags deployed at 99 miles per hour — suggesting “little attempt” to brake.
Bohm’s defense has previously indicated it may try to argue that the defendant was fleeing a road rage incident when the victims were hit.
Bohm remains free on a $4 million bond.
