In a Reuters Story today, life certainly proved at least as strange as Fiction. Two women in their 70s, dubbed the "Black Widows" of Los Angeles, were sentenced to life in prison without parole on Tuesday for befriending two homeless men and murdering them in hit-and-run-crashes in order to collect $2.8 million in life insurance.

Prosecutors said the women had befriended two homeless men at an Eastern European church, helped them find somewhere to live, took out life insurance policies on them, and then arranged to have them killed in hit-and-run car accidents in dark alleys.

The men, Paul Vados, 73, and Kenneth McDavid, 50, were run over by cars in different Los Angeles area alleys in 1999 and 2005 respectively.

Prosecutors said greed was the motive. The two women collectively received $2.8 million from life insurance and accidental death policies they had taken out on the two men by transferring their signatures onto rubber stamps to use on the forms.

Golay claimed to insurance companies that she was the fiancee of both victims, while Rutterschmidt claimed to be a cousin.

The women were arrested in May 2006 on suspicion of fraudulently collecting insurance payments. Investigators said the women might be responsible for more deaths, saying six other life insurance policies were not paid out because of suspicious circumstances.

(Reporting by Jill Serjeant; Editing by Eric Walsh) © Thomson Reuters 2008 All rights reserved