Andrew Luster

Andrew Luster

Luster never lacked female companionship. He had a number of live-in girlfriends over the years, and he was fond of bragging about his deft touch at picking up women — some young, some wealthy.

Luster apparently preferred young to wealthy.

As middle age beckoned, he continued to pursue a rather sad romantic life.

His favorite haunts were the college bars in the Isla Vista section and on State Street in Santa Barbara, where the clientele was not much more than half his age.

He was trawling for young hotties on that July Friday night in 2000 when he hooked up with the sloshed Carey at O'Malley's.

Carey later said she felt "sort of like a robot" after sipping the water that Luster delivered to the drunken dancers.

The night became a bacchanal.

Carey and her friend David left O'Malley's with Luster and a third man in Luster's SUV. They went to a Santa Barbara strip club but were turned away at the door because Carey and David were too drunk. Luster then drove the group 15 miles down the coast to his place at Mussel Shoals.

On the way, Carey and David apparently had sex in the back seat.

Luster's Toyota Forerunner

Luster said he saw Carey engage in oral sex with David. David later said he couldn't be certain because he was drunk or drugged, but he and Carey "probably" also had intercourse when she lifted her dress and straddled him in Luster's moving vehicle, a Toyota Forerunner.

When they arrived in Mussel Shoals, Carey went skinny dipping in the ocean in her thong, stripping off her dress as David and Luster watched. The men then escorted her inside Luster's house, and she went into the shower and had sex with Luster, she later said.

After the shower, Luster gave her another doctored drink.

"It tasted good," she said, but a "wave of heat" hit her.

"What the hell did you put in my drink?" she asked.

A Bottle of GBH

Luster replied, "Liquid Ecstasy," using the rave name for GHB, the date-rape drug gamma hydroxybutyric acid.

She and Luster then had sex a second time on his bed.

The next morning, Carey found herself naked in Luster's bed. David was asleep elsewhere in the house. She said she tried to leave but he had sex with her a third time. The woman said she may have had sex with a third man, Luster's friend.

Later that morning, Luster drove Carey and David to her apartment in Santa Barbara. She gave him her phone number.