Law&Crime Sidebar - Woman Slipped Casino Robbery Victim Fentanyl 'Instead' of Date Rape Drug: Cops

Episode Date: November 17, 2025

A judge set a woman's bail at $10 million after an alleged robbery scheme at a Washington casino turned into a homicide investigation. Raylin Marie Benzie is accused of putting fentanyl in the drink of her victim, Arslan, after forgetting her “usual” date rape drug. Law&Crime's Jesse Weber sits down with criminal defense attorney Skye Lazaro to unpack the astonishing details from the probable cause affidavit.PLEASE SUPPORT THE SHOW: Black Friday has come early at Cozy Earth!Right now, you can head to https://cozyearth.com and use code LAWANDCRIME on top of their sitewide sale — giving you up to 40% off in savings. These deals won’t last, so start your holiday shopping today! And if you get a Post-Purchase Survey, be sure to mention you heard about Cozy Earth right here!HOST:Jesse Weber: https://twitter.com/jessecordweberLAW&CRIME SIDEBAR PRODUCTION:YouTube Management - Bobby SzokeVideo Editing - Michael Deininger, Christina O'Shea, Alex Ciccarone, & Jay CruzScript Writing & Producing - Savannah Williamson & Juliana BattagliaGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSocial Media Management - Vanessa BeinSTAY UP-TO-DATE WITH THE LAW&CRIME NETWORK:Watch Law&Crime Network on YouTubeTV: https://bit.ly/3td2e3yWhere To Watch Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3akxLK5Sign Up For Law&Crime's Daily Newsletter: https://bit.ly/LawandCrimeNewsletterRead Fascinating Articles From Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3td2IqoLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrime/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lawandcrimeSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can binge all episodes of this Law and Crimes series ad-free right now. Join Wondry Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. A judge in Washington said a woman's bail at $10 million after an alleged robbery scheme at a casino turned into a homicide investigation. And the reason reportedly given to police as to why the deed turned deadly, it is absolutely astonishing. We're going to be sitting down with criminal defense attorney, Sky Lazzaro, to try to make sense of this bizarre tragedy and whether the defendant has any chance of beating a murder rap if she takes this to trial. Welcome to Sidebar. Presented by Law and Crime, I'm Jesse Weber. Now real quick, before we jump into this, can you believe the holidays are here? I thought

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Wrap the ones you love in luxury with Cozy Earth. The LNA Casino Hotel is a large entertainment complex on the Cowlitz Indian Reservation in Ridgefield, Washington. This isn't really far from Vancouver and Portland. They give out huge jackpots. They host big-name singers and comedians. But on October 5th, this hotel and casino became a crime scene. Cowlitz tribe police were called out when hotel staff found a man dead in a 10th floor hotel room.

Now, police have identified him only by the name of Arslan. They told local media outlets that the 38-year-old just had one name on his Washington driver's license. Now, I'll tell you what, we got our hands on a 20-page probable cause affidavit that goes into a lot more detail. It says that police spoke to witnesses, reviewed surveillance footage, obtained text messages, which all led them to 34-year-old Raylan Marie Benzzi from nearby Battleground Washington. And according to investigators, Benzzi was seen on camera going into Arslawn's hotel room in the early morning of October 4th. This is the day before his body was found. Now, apparently, she's inside for about an hour.

then leaves by herself, but she allegedly comes back a little while later with another man. They both apparently go inside the room, are in there for less than 10 minutes, and then they both leave. Now, the probable cause statement says that when police first interviewed Benzzi, she denied having anything to do with Arslan dying, reportedly saying, quote, no, no, no, he was bleeping snoring, he was sleeping, that's bleeping weird, that doesn't make any sense, he was bleeping snoring. Now, Ben Z reportedly told the police that she had first met Arslan in September when they allegedly agreed that Arslan would give Benzzi his casino winnings if she had sex with him, okay, so this arrangement. When they met up, though, on October 4th,

Arslan reportedly gave Benzzi a casino voucher for $1,280 when they went up to his room. But according to what Benzzi apparently told police, she and Arslan didn't actually have sex. When the officers asked if she felt bad, you know, for essentially going back on her word but keeping the money, she reportedly said no because he had disrespected her. This is according to the affidavit. She also told investigators that she saw green or money in Arslan's wallet. So when police searched the hotel room on October 5th, according to the affidavit, that wallet, his wallet, was empty. The affidavit reads, I executed a search warrant on Arslan's room 1031 on October 5th, 2025, and collected evidence, including liquid from drinking glasses on the tables near the bed.

I also saw the safe was a jar and saw a small value. pouch with a green lanyard inside the safe. The valuables pouch was empty. I saw Arslan's wallet was also empty. I also confirmed Arslan had been issued two keys, but I only found one in the room. I believe Benzzi still possessed the second room key. I also noticed there was no evidence of any drug use at all in the room. So the investigator who responded to Arslan's room noted the strange way that Arslan was positioned on the bed.

I saw Arslan deceased laying on his back on the bed. His legs were extended and crossed at the ankles. His arms were crossed on his chest and his hands clutching a cell phone. Arslan wore jeans with a belt on. The tag inside the front left belt line caught my attention because it was sticking out. This was suspicious to me because most people pull their pants on from the side and not the front using force to pull the tag out, then leave it out. I also saw one of his pants legs was around his heel without his leg fully pushed through,

which was also suspicious. So according to the affidavit, the medical examiner agreed with the investigator's assessment that this was a suspicious death. So how did an apparent sex work situation turned a parent or alleged robbery end up with Arslan dead and Raylan Benzzi locked up on a massive $10 million bail? Okay, so to talk about this, I want to bring on criminal defense attorney Sky Lazaro. Sky, so good to see you. Thanks for taking the time. One of the interesting aspects of this, aside from how sad it is and disturbing it is, it all takes place at this very public venue, right? A casino. There's one of the most surveilled places. I think in the

world, there are cameras absolutely everywhere. And I think from an investigative point of view, a prosecutorial point of view, but also I'm curious from a defense point of view, is that the end all be all? I mean, if they are watching this suspect on camera from a defense perspective, how bad is that video? How do you fight back against something like that? Anytime you have surveillance video, especially somewhere like a casino. because they're going to be able to document every movement she made within the casino on and off the elevator, you know, obviously not in the room, but they're going to be able to timestamp every single moment that she was with him throughout the course of the evening

and when she went back. I think that makes it pretty difficult to say either I wasn't there or it happened when I wasn't there, you know, if they can get a time of death nailed down. I think that from a defense standpoint makes it pretty difficult. to fight back on. You're going to have to come up with a different theory of it was an accident. I mean, you know, I don't know. And look, any good defense lawyer will say to their client, don't speak to the police without an attorney president. You put that to the side, though. What do you make of some of Benzie's alleged early statements to police? Pretty damaging for her. I think she makes some pretty damning

admissions and if there isn't a way to get those suppressed or there isn't a Miranda issue or a coercion issue or anything else, you know, some of those statements I think are going to be pretty hard to get past. You know, I think in a lot of cases, we all wish our clients wouldn't talk because some of the worst evidence we ever have are clients own words and they're really hard to keep out of court. Yeah, I mean, and I want to go through more of this evidence. And so police, they were able to put together a more complete timeline when they got their hands. And we talk about things that the defendant allegedly said when they got their hands on Benzie's text messages. And they were able to speak with people who knew Benzies.

So you have a woman who reportedly had only recently met her, met Benzzi. And according to the affidavit, told detectives, quote, The way she was reacting, I think she did something to cause this man to lose his life. Now, police also identified the man seen going in to Arslan's room with Benzzi, seemingly after Arslan. was already dead, a critical witness, the affidavit states the man told them, quote, she made a statement she drugged this bleep and that he probably OD'd and he's probably going to die. And yet another man apparently told investigators that Benzie admitted she put fentanyl in Arsland's drink and said he was unconscious and she couldn't wake him up. So according to this

witness, Benzie allegedly told him that she usually uses GHB or other so-called date rape drugs on men, but apparently she'd forgotten it. So she decided to use fentanyl instead. Now, Sky, if that is true, it kind of adds up with some of the other evidence that we're seeing here, particularly the surveillance footage. But I will ask you, those are potentially very damning statements that were made or allegedly made by the defendant. From a defense perspective, how bad are they? And is there ways to make sure they don't get into a trial and that a jury never hears them. Terrible. I mean, the fact, fentanyl, first of all, is

highly lethal in very small doses. And so she's using fentanyl. Any admission that she's using anything to drug someone, even if it's just to rob them, is problematic. I mean, she's already going there to allegedly commit a felony, and then she gives them too much and he ends up dead. So you kind of have two layers of criminal.

activity here, whereas at least felony murder, even if there wasn't any intention to actually kill him over the course of this, right? These statements get hard to keep out because they are the defendant's statements. The defendant statements almost always are going to come into a trial, whether they're spoken, text messages, you know, emails, we fight these all the time, trying to keep them out under hearsay or double hearsay rules. But, at the end of the day, most of the time the defendant's statements can be used against them in court. Does it seem to you that a prosecutor would be able to then introduce into evidence at a trial, if this is statement's true, all other alleged instances of her using date rape

drugs on men, that this becomes a case where it's not just about Arslan, but other pattern of activity, or is that going to be not relevant to prejudicial? Because that's, statement is quite a statement to think about what else she might have allegedly been up to. I would almost guarantee that the prosecutor is going to seek to introduce any statements or any other instances of what we call bad acts that would normally be kept out. In certain instances, those can come into a criminal trial, especially in a case like this where if the prosecutor can show that she's done this before, she has a pattern of meeting men, drugging them to rob them, whatever it is. Now, the defense is going to argue exactly what you said,

that it's too prejudicial, that it's not similar enough, that bad acts shouldn't come in, it should be about just what happened here. But when she makes a statement that she's done this before, it was supposed to be like all the other times, except this guy ended up dead. Yeah, I think that's an uphill battle for the defense to keep that out. I think there's a good possibility that that evidence could be brought into this trial. And what's also shocking is if these allegations are true, essentially she just can't keep the details of what happened to herself. Because let me add this as well. The police, they get a search warrant for Benzie's cell phone.

We know cell phone's like the most critical piece of evidence out there. The text messages laid out in the affidavit arguably appear to indicate premeditation and planning, at least when it comes to the purported robbery. Okay. So you have one message that was apparently sent to a man named Derek and it read, quote, LMAO, I'm dead. I need to find a rich man to rob, L.O.L. I'm about to be evicted out of my spot. And I can't have that because I don't have any family's house I can go to or a bleeping car since I just told my new one. I just thought, so I'm tripping. You got any ideas. And there was another message to someone named Shea, where she again apparently talked about drugging someone and taking their money, quote, I'm bored. And I've been putting in work on this dude that I'm going to bet he's got 100K in his bank account.

right now. And Shay reportedly responded and why he's supposed to just give it to you, to which Benzie allegedly said, L-O-L, no, I'm going to get to know him, then drug him to sleep and take it. So again, going back to the, there's one thing to say, okay, what do the witnesses say, right? What do they say? What do they recall? Are they credible? Messages like that, thoughts? Messages are even harder. I mean, you're right. When you're talking about witnesses, you know, obviously her defense team is going to get into who are these people. Are they credible? Do they have a history? Are they planning with her? Are they doing the same things? All of that. All of those types of things that we can put before a jury to try to say,

hey, they're lying, they're making it up, whatever it is. When you have the defendant's words in a text message where it's written down that you can put before a jury, that's pretty hard evidence to get past. You know, you can say she's joking. You can say she didn't mean it. But the fact that she talked about why she needed the money, that she was trying to do this to another guy, that this was a plan that she had, and then she goes and does it. That evidence is most likely coming in, especially where it's her text messages, as long as they can authenticate them. And I think a jury is going to look at that pretty favorably for the state, not the defendant. Well, I have more for you.

There was another of Benzie's apparent text messages or text conversations with a man that were included in this probable cause statement. and Benzzi allegedly discussed needing drugs to make Arslan go, quote, night night. She apparently said she was planning to give him 200 milligrams of Valium. But I will say around the time that Arslan died, Benzzi's messages started to get increasingly panicked and frenzied with her reportedly sending texts like, OMG, call me! Exclamation point, exclamation point, exclamation point. Babe, call me, I'm freaking T.F. out.

Exclamation point, exclamation point, exclamation point. Everything went wrong, exclamation point, exclamation point, exclamation point. And then she starts texting, or apparently texting another man named Alfonso with the messages switching to all caps. I panicked and did something dumb. I need out of here, please. And there's also, I could go away for a very long bleeping time and I just need out of here. Now, despite her apparent agitation and fear, the surveillance video confirms that at this point,

Benzie went up to the room, was in there for a few minutes, when Alphi was. Lonzo texted that he was on his way to pick her up. Benzie reportedly responded that she was, quote, in the room looking for cash. Now, Sky, even if she were to take the stand at her trial, you know, if this goes to trial, I'm struggling to find a way for her to explain this other than her, allegedly committing a series of crimes. I tend to agree with you. I think this is probably a case where she can't testify because anything that you could

keep out if you put her on the stand is likely going to come. in. And I don't know that there's a good explanation for this. Now, I will say this. When we look at probable cause statements issued by the state, it is always just going to include their greatest hits. So we don't know what else is out there in discovery that might be more favorable to her or might put things in a different context and things along that. But taking what we know with what's in the probable cost statement, the way it's been presented by the state, these text messages are going to be very hard for her to explain away and for a defense team to explain away. That being said, you know, as discovery goes on, sometimes things get better, sometimes they get

worse. Well, let's also talk about another piece of evidence because according to court documents, Arslan's toxicology report showed that he did have fentanyl in his system, and it was the only drug they found evidence of. There was a warrant that was put out for Benzie's arrest on charges of first-degree murder, controlled substance homicide, placing poison in a drink, first-degree robbery, second-degree theft. And according to a supplemental report that was included with the probable cause statement, Benzzi was arrested on Halloween in Vancouver. This is when police connected her with a car that had been stolen a couple weeks earlier. That led to her also being charged with possession of a stolen vehicle. And on November 4th, according to news outlet KATU, a judge raised

Benzies bail to $10 million. Now, Sky, were you surprised about that number? Surprise she has bail at all, to be honest. In a state like Utah, this would be a no bail case. And I know, you know, different states have different bail statutes. But I'm not surprised by the $10 million. I think that's probably akin to the judge giving her a no bail warrant because it's so high, even if she could post it through a bail bondsman, that number is probably FARC, anything she's going to be able to meet. But she doesn't help herself. I mean, it goes from bad to worse for her, right? You know, not only she alleged to committed all these crimes, but then she's got a stolen car. She's arrested in the stolen car. Now she's committing, you know, another felony

and another jurisdiction. So I'm not surprised by that bail amount. I'm actually somewhat surprised that she has bail at all. The first degree robbery and the second degree theft, maybe on its face, may be more straightforward. Is there a way, though, when it comes to first-degree murder or a control substance homicide, placing poison in a drink? I don't know. Are there ways to reduce that? Are there ways for her, let's say, to negotiate, let's first, from a legal point of view,

from a defense point of view, if she were to take it to trial, is there a way to convince the jury that those elements aren't met, or is that going to be very difficult for her? That's possible. And I think that actually, you know, the first-degree murder. the mens rea or the state's going to have to prove on first-degree murder is going to be intentionally unknowingly or that she planned it. I think even her text messages and her communications to people show, yes, she went there with the intention to rob him, but not the intention to kill him. And so I think there's a way to argue to a jury or to the state. I think this

is a case really you try to resolve without going to trial. I don't know that this is one you want to try to a jury just because of the messages that. out there and how damaging they are. But I think you do try to resolve this case with something lesser, something, you know, like a reckless type mindset where it was accidental. Yes, she intended to drug him so that she could rob them but didn't intend to kill him. Maybe you get down to a manslaughter or something along those lines where you take the intent down and you can drop it down a few degrees, which probably lessens the amount of time that she would do in custody on this case. So one thing I'll mention, Sky, and you mentioned it before is, and I can't

100% confirm which one of these would count for first degree, but it says under Washington law, if murder in the first degree, it can be a few different things. It could be a person's guilty of murder in the first degree when, with a premeditated intent to cause the death of another person, he or she causes the death of such person or of a third person. So you might be right. There might not be an intent to kill. Or under circumstances manifesting an extreme indifference to human life, he or she engages in conduct, which creates a grave risk of death to any person, and thereby causes the death of a person. That could be problematic if, like, you intend to give a drug, which is very, very dangerous.

Fentol, right, and someone dies. Or this is another one he or she commits or attempts to commit the crime of either robbery, and then there's other ones that don't really apply. And then during, in the furtherance of such crime or an immediate flight therefrom, he or she causes the death of a person other than one of the participants. So that's the felony murder rule, right? Those are the different ways they might be getting her. Now I'm looking at this and saying her options might be limited.

You're right on those instances. You know, the first one I think maybe you can make the argument that there was no intent to kill. But under those other two prongs, we were talking about acting in a manner that could cause or you know would cause a death where she gave them fentanyl instead of the GHB and we have that in a text message and then committing a robbery. I think the state has multiple ways that they can get to potentially a first degree murder charge on her. And so this really probably is a case where if you're the defense, you just try to do as much mitigation work as you can to try to get a deal where you don't end up in trial. Yeah, so she's scheduled now to be in court in January.

What can we expect next? Do you think that there's prosecutors would be open to some sort of plea deal here? Or are they like, we have you dead to rights? You know, if you want to plead guilty, you're pleading guilty to everything. It's going to be somewhat dependent on a number of factors. And one of those is also going to be the victim's family. You know, how much do they want to go through in terms of pre-trial litigation or a trial in this case? Not that they have the last say in what happens, but I do think prosecutors work closely with families in cases like this to get their take on it and see really what they want and get their input.

And if they're like, hey, just resolve this, we don't want to get drug through this. They may be more inclined to offer a deal. They're going to have a plethora of charges, a charger with that's going to end up with some significant prison time. I don't think she's going to escape that in this case. But I do think there are ways that this case could be resolved if the state is so inclined and you're right, they may just say, this is really egregious. She's done this before.

This is a pattern of behavior. She's lucky no one else has ever died. and we're not going to back down on it. What a case. What a case. All right. Let's see where it goes. Scott Lazaro, thank you so much for taking the time. Really appreciate it. Thanks for having me.

And that's all we have for you right now here on Sidebar. Everybody, thank you so much for joining us. And as always, please subscribe on YouTube, Apple Podcast, Spotify, wherever you get your podcasts. You can follow me on X or Instagram. I'm Jesse Weber. I'll speak to you next time. You can binge all episodes of this law and crime series ad free right now on Wondery Plus. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.