SAN FRANCISCO—On Friday, January 26, 2001, shortly after 4 p.m. in the hallway of a Pacific Heights apartment complex, Marjorie Knoller’s neighbor, 33-year-old lacrosse coach, Diane Whipple, was returning from grocery shopping when she got mauled by Knoller’s and her lawyer-husband, Robert Noel’s two Presa Canario dogs.
The dogs Hera, weighing 100 pounds, and Bane, weighing 140 pounds. Whipple received 77 bites from being mauled.
Noble was indicted of involuntary manslaughter and Knoller of second-degree murder by a grand jury in March 2001. In March 2001, the two were convicted by a Los Angeles jury. In June 2002, a judge reduced Knoller’s conviction to an involuntary manslaughter, citing lack of evidence for ‘implied malice.’ In July 2002, she was sentenced for four years in prison and released in 2004.
In May 2007, the California Supreme Court sent the case back to lower courts to reinstate the murder conviction. In August 2008, Superior Court Judge Charlotte Woolard reinstated the second-degree murder conviction. In September 2008, Knoller was sentenced to 15 years to life in prison.
In February 2019, she was denied parole the first time. In February 2023, she was denied again the second time. The last parole denial was Sunday, February 15, 2026. She is currently being incarcerated at Central California Women’s Facility (CCWF) in Chowchilla.
Following murder charges, she resigned from the California State Bar. Her husband, Noble was disbarred in 2007. After his prison release after completing 3.5 years of a 4-year sentence, he became a baker and was later homeless. He died in a nursing home in La Jolla, San Diego on his 77th birthday on June 22, 2018.
