Prosecuters will say narcotics played no role in the temple murders. The evidence suggests other wise.

Perhaps not since the Manson family crawled out of the desert has there been a crime scene as horrible and baffling as the one Maricopa County Sheriff's deputies were called to on the morning of August 10, 1991.

Inside Wat Promkunaram, a Buddhist temple in the far west valley, nine bodies were arranged in a loose circle on the floor of a common living room. Through the victims' posture suggested they might be bent in prayer, one, two or three small bullet holes punctuated the back of each head. Someone had executed these people.

Alessandro ''Alex'' Garcia, 17, has pleaded guilty to these murders and has agreed to testify against the alleged triggerman, 18-year old Johnathan Doody. In addition to Garcia's testimony, prsecuters will introduce at trial a smattering of physical and circumstancial evidence, and Doodys own self-incriminating statements.For the investigators, the rest is epilogue:They have their killers.

''There is overwhelming evidence that Johnathan Doody and Alex Garcia acted alone,'' says sergent russ kimball, the Maricopa county Sheriffs office detective who orginized the multiagency Major Crimes task force to investigate the murders. For kimball and other investigators, the facts render speculation about motives immaterial: There is a reason some crimes are described as ''senseless.''

Still, the murders at Wat Promkunaram have from the beginning been occluded by rumor, dread and political intrigue.Immediatly after the massacre was reported, stories began to circulate that the Buddhists had been murderd by Asian gangsters and their murders were somehow connected to drug trafficking.

That is not a theory to wich prosecuters subscribe. But it is an issue that Doody's attorney, Peter Balkan, intends to raise at trial.Through Balkan says he does not have the resources to thoroughly investigate a drug angle, internal sheriffs office documents obtained by New Times indicate the investigators also found a trap door that had concealed a plywood-lined space near the recessed altar on the west wall of the sanctuary.

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