A 44-year-old man previously convicted of manslaughter pleaded not guilty Monday in the strangulation death of a former Hollywood High School teacher, who had been his pen pal, according to a prosecutor.
Scott Kratlian, also known as Scott Porter, was charged with murder after Harry Major, 82, was found dead in his Hollywood home on Feb. 12.
Major died of strangulation, according to a coroner’s report. The death was ruled a homicide.
Kratlian was taken into custody on Feb. 18 by a Los Angeles Police Department and FBI task force.
Kratlian and Major became pen pals while the suspect was serving a sentence for manslaughter in a New York prison, said Deputy District Attorney Tony Cho of the Elder Abuse Section in a new release on the plea.
He was convicted in 1993 in New York for first-degree murder, according to a criminal complaint provided by the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office.
Kratlian was released in late 2013 and then came to Los Angeles, Cho said.
