[Updated: Tue., May 27, 2025, 1:48pm]
First-degree attempted murder charges were filed against Russell Maxwell Phay, the 42-year-old resident of Henderson, Nevada, who allegedly broke into the Montecito home of Beanie Babies mogul Ty Warner this Wednesday and beat a 60-year-old financial services executive then on the premises into a coma. There’s no evidence that Phay used a weapon in the assault, but Santa Barbara County District Attorney John Savrnoch described the defendant as “a big guy, about 6′3″ and weighing about 250 pounds.”
The charges filed assert that Phay — who had served in the military about 20 years ago — acted on a “willful, deliberate, and premeditated” manner within the meaning of the law. There is no evidence that Phay knew the house was owned by Ty Warner when he broke into it. The filing statement does indicate Warner was in the property at the time of the attack. Savrnoch said it is not clear whether Phay and Warner — famously reclusive and protective of his privacy — ever occupied the same room at the same time.
The victim, Linda Malek-Aslanian, is described in her LinkedIn account as financial services agent working for New York Life Insurance. According to the employment history listed on her BrokerCheck report, she was employed from 2004 to 2015 as an asset manager for Ty Warner Hotels & Resorts. The charging document asserts the attack rendered the victim “comatose due to brain injury.”
Phay is being held in county jail on $1 million bail for a host of charges: first degree attempted murder, kidnapping, residential burglary, assault with a force likely to produce great bodily injury, and resisting and delaying a police officer. Phay has pleaded not guilty to all charges. He’s scheduled for a preliminary hearing setting on June 2, and the preliminary hearing is slated to take place the following day.
When Phay allegedly broke into Warner’s home, reports indicated he claimed the house was his own and was demanding everyone in it get out. When law enforcement got the call, they responded under the belief it was a potential hostage situation. The call elicited a dramatic show of force from multiple law enforcement agencies. A BearCat armored vehicle was deployed, as were dogs, a co-response unit, and a helicopter. When law enforcement arrived, Phay holed up inside a second-story bathroom and sought to barricade himself in. At some point, he jumped from the second-story bathroom window onto the ground below. There, sheriff’s K-9 dogs helped take him into custody.
Phay had been slated to serve in Kuwait but his tour of duty expired just before he was to be deployed. Upon returning to civilian life, relations between Phay and his wife reportedly went south, and when she sought to flee with their child, he attacked her with sufficient violence to serve time behind bars. After getting out, he had other brushes with law enforcement and was eligible for diversion programs targeting former military personnel with mental health issues.
In charging documents, DA Savrnoch filed special allegations against Phay, stating he posed a serious danger to society, that his prior criminal offenses were both numerous and of increasing severity, and that his performance while on probation, parole, and post-release supervision was “unsatisfactory.”
Savrnoch said he is unaware how long Phay has been in Santa Barbara.
