Writer Who Eluded Law for 2 Years Is Arrested

Romance writer Barbara Joslyn ended her two-year run from justice last week by thrusting a knife into her chest as police officers pounded on the door of her $40-a-night Century City motel room.

Joslyn, 48, was in the jail ward of County-USC Medical Center on Saturday, recovering from her wounds.

The grim close to the fugitive chapter of Joslyn’s life offset its stylish start, when she fled New York after being convicted in 1995 of stealing a Picasso sketch from a friend’s Park Avenue apartment.

New York law enforcement officials expect Joslyn to be returned there to begin a four-year prison sentence, but she must first face charges that she failed to pay a fine for a credit card fraud conviction in Beverly Hills.

FBI agents and LAPD officers confirmed Saturday that they had arrested Joslyn early Tuesday morning at the Stars Inn on Santa Monica Boulevard.

The officers knocked on the door of Joslyn’s room about 7 a.m. Tuesday, attempting to serve her with a federal arrest warrant for unlawful flight to avoid prosecution.

Joslyn refused to open the door, which the officers then forced open by banging it with a cement block, according to the motel’s manager, Maritza Guerrero.

Guerrero said the officers then sprayed tear gas into the room, and Joslyn--who had apparently stabbed herself--fled out of the bathroom window.

She was caught behind the motel by the officers and was taken to County-USC for treatment, police said.

Joslyn, who had lived in West Hollywood, is the author of two romance novels, “Strange Sins” and Private Dancers.”

Joslyn confessed in September 1994 to joining Australian film producer Ian Pringle in a burglary of a friend’s apartment.

On a trip to New York City, Joslyn visited the apartment of longtime friend Crawford Greenleaf, widower of an heir to the Revlon fortune.

Joslyn told police that when she left the apartment to have lunch with Greenleaf, she was able to leave the door ajar.

Pringle then snuck in and made off with the Picasso, a painting by Edouard Vuillard and other valuables worth $700,000.

Pringle, producer of “Romper Stomper,” a documentary on neo-Nazi skinheads, pleaded guilty to the theft and served a nine-month sentence.

Though Joslyn confessed to her role in the theft, she changed her story at her trial, saying Greenleaf had enlisted her in a scheme to defraud his insurance company by staging a burglary.

Joslyn fled New York while awaiting sentencing in August 1995. She told a New York Times reporter then that serving jail time would be “tantamount to a death sentence.”

She eluded New York City police and federal agents for 18 months, despite appearing in a Beverly Hills courtroom in October 1995--two months after fleeing. There, she pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor card fraud charge.

Joslyn’s failure to pay the fine in that case resulted in a recent arrest warrant being issued by the Beverly Hills Police Department. That warrant tipped federal officials that Joslyn might be in Los Angeles, according to news reports.

She is scheduled to be arraigned on that charge Monday, according to law enforcement officials.

Stars Inn manager Guerrero said Joslyn never tried to conceal her identity. Joslyn used her true name when she checked in seven months ago, though she did say she didn’t have identification because she was from Canada, Guerrero said.

Joslyn at first paid for her room weekly, but after about a month began to pay daily with cash. Joslyn usually spent days in her room, a basic single with a queen-sized bed and a small television, Guerrero said.

Joslyn did not have a car, and would usually walk to her destinations, though friends would visit her every two or three weeks, Guerrero said.

Guerrero remembers Joslyn as always being stylishly dressed, in high heels and with many different skirts and dresses. She often carried a Bloomingdale’s shopping bag, she said.