Police: Singer’s credit card used after he died

Law enforcement authorities believe a Costa Mesa bar owner and member of the 1980s punk band M.I.A., found dead last week, slipped and fell in an icy motel parking lot in suburban Chicago after a woman he had been “partying with” took his cell phone and credit card, a Cook County Sheriff’s Department official said Monday.

Sheriff’s deputies arrested Adrienne Kastaneda, 34, Friday after the woman tried to use the credit card of Avalon Bar owner and musician Michael Conley to make a small purchase at a store near her home in Leyden Township, an unincorporated area about 35 minutes west of downtown Chicago, said Penny Mateck, a spokeswoman for the sheriff’s department.

Authorities believe Conley and Kastaneda met in downtown Chicago while Conley was traveling on business and the two “began partying together and took a cab back to Leyden Township,” Mateck said.

Conley and Kastaneda rented a room from one of his employees at the O’Hare Kitchenette Motel at 2 or 3 a.m., motel owner Michael Pollard said.

“The room wasn’t even really used,” he said.

Police allowed Pollard back into the motel room for the first time Monday, which was orderly except for the fingerprint powder investigators left in the room, he said.

Kastaneda allegedly took two credit cards and a cell phone from Conley without his knowledge at the motel room before returning to her nearby home, Mateck said. Officials believe Conley slipped and fell in the parking lot when he left the motel room to look for Kastaneda, Mateck said.

Another motel guest on her way to work found Conley lying near a curb in the parking lot about 5:40 a.m. Thursday with head injuries. The woman tried to revive him with CPR before he was taken to a nearby hospital. Conley was pronounced dead at 6:25 a.m. Thursday.

Officials are still waiting for the results of toxicology tests on Conley, which could take six to eight weeks, according to the Cook County medical examiner’s office.

Conley, 48, was the frontman for the hardcore punk band M.I.A., which played with bands such as Social Distortion and the Dead Kennedys in the 1980s. Friends of Conley have set up a memorial fund to pay for the education of Conley’s three daughters, ages 18, 9 and 5. Visit www.mikeconleyfamilyfund.com for more information.

“It was a tragic and freak accident ...” a site posting stated, written by Scott Rew, a family friend who is overseeing donations to the memorial fund. “It doesn’t change anything, but we are all somewhat heartened to know that the early rumors, which led us all to imagine the worst, were not accurate and that hopefully he did not suffer.”

BRIANNA BAILEY may be reached at (714) 966-4625 or at brianna.bailey@latimes.com.