Las Vegas Criminal Defense Blog

Last Friday, a twenty-two year old man from Lockwood pleaded not guilty in First Judicial District Court in Virginia City to felony counts of open murder and violating the Nevada crime of battery on a peace officer with substantial bodily harm. These charges stem from the October beating death of a forty-seven year old woman.

Police claim that the accused beat the victim after she denied him a cigarette, starting an altercation outside of the Rainbow Bend Community Center. He then reportedly left the scene and fought with a cop prior to arrest, which led to the charge for the Nevada crime of battery on a peace officer. His trial is set for November.

The Nevada crime of battery on a peace officer is defined as unlawful use of force or violence on a peace officer, which includes policemen, fire department employees, and court judges. If substantial bodily harm occurs, it may be charged as a felony and carries a prison term of two to ten years and/or a fine of up to $10,000. If there’s no substantial harm, it may be charged as a gross misdemeanor, carrying up to a year in jail and/or a fine of up to $2,000.

Read more about this story at http://www.nevadaappeal.com/article/20100220/NEWS/100219472/0/FRONTPAGE.

A fifty-six year old woman, who faces nearly sixty counts of felony theft and forgery in Las Vegas, was arrested in Great Falls, Montana last week. She’s accused of stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars from the company for which she used to be an executive director. Prosecutors claim she’s admitted to forging business checks and using the company’s credit card to withdraw unauthorized sums to help pay off her debts from gambling.

The Clark County District Attorney is following Nevada extradition law in attempt to bring the former executive back into the state. They originally recommended a bond of $177,000, but the judge lowered it to $10,000. The District Attorney’s office is concerned that it will be more difficult to extradite the former executive if she’s released on bond.

Nevada extradition law is a complicated, potentially drawn out process of trying to bring suspected fugitives back into state to answer their charges here. If someone in another state is arrested for charges in Nevada, Nevada extradition law allows them either to waive extradition and come back or to try to fight the extradition there via a hearing. If they waive extradition, it may take several months for Nevada law enforcement to bring them back.

Read more at http://www.kfbb.com/news/local/84817817.html

Three weeks ago a federal grand jury in Oklahoma City convicted a California man of interstate travel from Nevada to Oklahoma for the purpose of having sexual relations with an eight year old girl as well as possessing child pornography. An informant for the FBI acted as the girl’s mother, which is how he was eventually caught. When he was arrested in Oklahoma, he had a laptop allegedly containing child pornography.

The crime of child pornography possession in Nevada outlaws possessing anything showing or involving children in a sexual manner or that’s meant to appeal to sexual desires. The crime of child pornography possession in Nevada encompasses all possible media that may depict children obscenely, including photographs, videos and audio recordings.

The penalties for the crime of child pornography possession in Nevada are very harsh if the child is under age sixteen. A first offense is charged as a category B felony, carrying one to six years imprisonment. Subsequent offenses are charged as a category A felony, carrying one year to life imprisonment with the possibility of parole. The judge may also order fines of up to $5,000.

Yesterday a Wisconsin businessman was arraigned for allegedly not paying back $3.75 million in casino markers to Caesars Palace and the Hard Rock Hotel. His attorney said before the hearing, “All of it is in dispute . . . He never ran up that kind of debt and how he got that much credit is shocking.” The businessman faces up to eighteen years in prison if he's convicted.

Markers are short-term zero-interest loans that casinos lend qualified customers to encourage them to gamble. Nevada casino marker law makes it a crime to not pay back these markers, usually within thirty days. If the marker is for $250 or more, the customer can be charged with a felony, carrying one to four years, up to $5,000 in fines, administrative fees and full restitution. Unpaid markers of less than $250 are prosecuted as misdemeanors, carrying up to six months in jail and/or up to a $1,000 fine.

Anyone charged with breaking Nevada casino marker law who then flees Nevada may be extradited back into the state to answer charges. If someone accused of breaking Nevada casino marker law has no criminal history, then prosecutors are usually very willing to negotiate a payment plan and to dismiss the case without any jail once restitution has been made. If the state decides not to prosecute a casino marker case, the casinos can sue civilly.

Read more about this case at http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2010/feb/22/man-enters-plea-over-charges-tied-375m-markers/.

Last week a nineteen year old was arrested on two counts of Nevada felony DUI causing death in Henderson. She allegedly crashed into a Hyundai SUV at Horizon Ridge Parkway and Shaded Canyon Drive, killing the two people in the car. Police say her BAC at the time was .26, which is three times the legal limit.

People may be charged for Nevada felony DUI causing death if they operated a vehicle while intoxicated and had a fatal car accident. The driver can still be convicted if his/her BAC was less than .08 as long as the state can prove the driver was driving under the influence of alcohol or a drug.

Convictions for Nevada felony DUI causing death are very harsh. It’s a category B felony, carrying two to twenty years imprisonment. They may also be fined $2,000 to $5,000. However, the Department of Corrections will try to segregate people convicted for these DUIs from violent offenders and house them in a minimum security facility.

Last Friday, a jury in Washoe County District Court convicted a forty-nine year old man of breaking Nevada stalking law as well as attempted murder, criminal anarchy and shooting into occupied homes. These charges resulted from an alleged six-year-long “domestic terror spree,” where the suspect supposedly tried to kill a female janitor.

The suspect was originally sentenced to forty-five years on these charges back in 2007. However, the Nevada Supreme Court overturned his conviction, which led to this retrial. He will be sentenced again in May.

Nevada stalking law makes it a crime to willfully engage in any kind of conduct that would cause a reasonable person to feel terrorized, intimidated, frightened or harassed. A first offense for breaking Nevada stalking law is a misdemeanor, punishable by up to six months in jail and/or up to a $1,000 fine, and a subsequent offense is a gross misdemeanor, punishable by up to one year in jail and/or up to $2,000 in fines. If the stalking also includes threats of bodily harm or death, it’s charged as a felony, carrying prison time of two to fifteen years and maybe a $5,000 fine.

A nineteen-year-old New Zealand woman auctioned off her virginity online for tens of thousands of dollars, which she intends to use to fund her university education. More than thirty thousand people viewed her website and over 1,200 people bid. The New Zealand police said that the auction hasn’t explicitly broken any laws since it was transacted through a licensed Nevada brothel.

Nevada Prostitution law prohibits the trade of sex for money except for in licensed brothels. Breaking Nevada prostitution law is charged as a misdemeanor, carrying up to six months in jail and/or up to $1,000 in fines. However, first-time offenders can usually get their case dismissed if they pay a fine and attend an AIDS class or “John School.”

If the defendant in a prostitution case was aware they had HIV, the judge will order stiffer penalties, including two to ten years in prison and a $10,000 fine. A defendant convicted of soliciting children also faces harsher punishments, including one to four years in prison and maybe a $5,000 fine. Typical defenses used to fight a prostitution charge include entrapment, lack of evidence and mistake.

A former bailiff of former Clark County District Judge Elizabeth Halverson was arrested on Valentine’s Day on charges of breaking Nevada sexual assault law and lewdness with a minor law. North Las Vegas police were called to a residence on reports that the former bailiff allegedly assaulted a fourteen-year-old. The victim is said to be the daughter of the former bailiff’s friend.

The former bailiff was a witness in the infamous recent case that contributed to Judge Halverson’s ousting. The former bailiff accused her of performing services well beyond the call of duty, including picking lint off her judicial robe with scotch tape and slipping on her shoes. Halverson denied any wrongdoing and claimed the former bailiff would insist on helping her with her shoes.

Nevada sexual assault law (rape) makes it a crime to force another person to have sex. If bodily harm results and the victim is a child of age 14 or 15, the penalties for breaking Nevada sexual assault law include life without the possibility of parole. If no substantial bodily harm results, penalties include life with the possibility of parole after twenty-five years. However, if the suspect was previously convicted of a sexual offense, the sentence will be life without parole.

Read the whole story here: http://www.lvrj.com/news/breaking_news/Man-arrested-in-sexual-assault-in-North-Las-Vegas-84354872.html

Last week, a judge in Washoe District Court revoked the probation of a Reno man for allegedly assaulting his former wife with a knife. The judge then sentenced the sixty-year-old to up to six years in prison for assault with a deadly weapon. The defendant originally fled, but detectives of the Northern Nevada Repeat Offender Program found him.

When issuing an order granting probation, the court may fix the terms of probation, require that the probationer dispose of his weapons, and mandate any other reasonable conditions that would ensure the health, safety or welfare of the community. The probationer may also be ordered to stay within a certain state or county or to refrain from contacting or seeing a certain person. Probationers are under the supervision of the Chief Parole and Probation Officer.

Nevada probation violation law is taken very seriously by judges. Sometimes, just the slightest misstep can cause a judge to deem that you’ve broken Nevada probation violation law. People on probation may find themselves back in jail for the smallest things like jaywalking, not reporting to their officers, or failing a drug or alcohol test.

In January, a Carson City man pleaded guilty to breaking felony attempted statutory sexual seduction law in Nevada. He was arrested in November after allegedly having sexual relations with a fifteen-year-old. Her parents discovered emails and texts they since sent to each other that referred to the encounter, which led to his arrest.

Statutory sexual seduction law in Nevada makes it a crime for an adult of eighteen or older to have sexual relations with someone under the age of sixteen. The penalty for committing statutory sexual seduction law in Nevada depends on the age of the alleged perpetrator. If he/she is twenty-one or older, it’s a category C felony, punishable by one to five years in prison and maybe a $10,000 fine. If he/she is under twenty-one, it’s a gross misdemeanor, punishable by up to one year in jail and/or up to a $2,000 fine.

When the defendant is a school teacher and the victim is a pupil at the school, penalties vary. If the victim is sixteen or seventeen years old, the teacher also faces one to five years in prison and maybe a $10,000 fine. But if the victim is fourteen or fifteen, he/she faces one to six years in prison and maybe a $5,000 fine.

A California man was sentenced last month in Nevada federal court on child pornography charges. While living in Reno, he allegedly coerced an eight-year-old into performing sexual acts, and he’s now looking at more than twenty-four years in federal prison. He had no prior criminal record.

One breaks Nevada child pornography law by owning, creating or selling photos, videos or other media of children engaging in sexual conduct. Penalties for breaking Nevada child pornography law are extremely serious and vary depending on whether the suspect allegedly produced it, advertised it or possessed it. It’s also considered a crime involving moral turpitude, so non-citizens convicted of it face deportation from the U.S.

Using or promoting the use of a child in pornography is a category A felony, carrying a life sentence. Advertising child pornography is a category B felony, carrying one to fifteen years in prison. And possessing child pornography is a category B felony for a first offense—subsequent convictions are category A. Defenses to charges of breaking Nevada child pornography law include “lack of intent” and the media in question not qualifying as pornography.

A woman who falsely accused Vegas showman David Copperfield of sexual assault has now been charged with prostitution in Washington State. According to a police report, she solicited prostitution from a businessman in Bellevue, and when he refused to pay, she called the cops to report harassment. Their investigation resulted in the District Attorney bringing prostitution charges against her.

In Las Vegas, prostitution is defined as the exchange of sexual favors for a fee. It’s punished as a misdemeanor, which means that the maximum Las Vegas prostitution penalties a defendant can face is six months in jail and a $1,000 fine. When the defendant is just a first-time offender, however, Las Vegas prostitution penalties are usually much less harsh:

A first time offender in Nevada can typically have a prostitution charge dismissed in exchange for completing “john school” or an AIDS education course and paying a $250 fine (and not getting arrested again until the course is completed and the money is paid). If the alleged prostitute is aware that she/he is HIV-positive, however, Las Vegas prostitution penalties are greatly increased to include a high fine and several years of imprisonment.

For National Stalking Awareness Month last month, the Nevada Network Against Domestic Violence (NNAADV) and Domestic Violence Intervention (DVI) of Churchill County aimed to inform the general public about what it means to break stalking and Nevada harassment law and how to fight it. Unfortunately, it’s a very difficult criminal offense to prove, so it’s important to keep recordings if possible of any events related to it.

Nevada harassment law makes it a crime to knowingly threaten to cause someone bodily injury, to physically damage their property, to subject someone to physical confinement, or to do anything else intended to substantially harm the person’s physical or mental health or safety. Also, the victim must be placed in reasonable fear that any threats made will be carried out. Harassment is frequently charged along with the crime of stalking.

A first conviction for breaking Nevada harassment law is a misdemeanor, punishable by up to six months in jail and/or up to a $1,000 fine. Any subsequent conviction is a gross misdemeanor, punishable by up to one year in jail and/or up to a $2,000 fine. In addition, victims are at liberty to seek out other legal remedies.

On Friday, a man allegedly tried to take off all his clothes at the terminal check-in in the Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport. He was arrested for disorderly conduct and indecent exposure for undressing. The man later told police his actions were the result of him missing his medication for bi-polar disorder.

In Nevada, people break Las Vegas indecent exposure law (NRS 201.220) by exposing their private parts, especially in a sexually suggestive way, such as flashers. Suspected prostitutes are frequently arrested for indecent exposure if cops find them soliciting by bearing their bodies. A mother breast-feeding her child is not considered indecent exposure in Nevada.

A first offense for breaking Las Vegas indecent exposure law is a gross misdemeanor, carrying up to one year in jail and/or up to a $2,000 fine. Any subsequent offense for breaking Las Vegas indecent exposure law is a category D felony, punishable by one to four years in prison and maybe a $5,000 fine. People charged with this crime are frequently also charged with open or gross lewdness.

On Wednesday, a seventy-year-old man allegedly crashed his car through the entrance of Laughlin’s Edgewater Hotel-Casino, killing two and injuring seven. He was arrested and charged with two counts of felony reckless driving causing death and was booked into the Laughlin Jail. The suspect had only minor injuries.

Witnesses say the suspect drove past a red light and struck a raised medium before speeding into the casino. The car apparently hit at least nine people and many slot machines before finally stalling near the cashier’s cage. The two fatalities that occurred were the eleventh and twelfth in Las Vegas Metro’s jurisdiction so far in 2010.

The Laughlin Jail, also called the Tucker Holding facility, is where suspects are originally booked if they’re arrested in Laughlin. The Laughlin Jail is very small, and inmates rarely stay there for more than two or three days before either being released or transferred to Clark County Detention Center. As opposed to most jails, Laughlin Jail does not provide uniforms or commissary privileges.

Roger “Black Mamba” Mayweather has been charged with battery-strangulation, battery causing substantial bodily harm and breaking Las Vegas coercion law in Clark County in connection with his alleged attack on a female boxer in August. The victim testified that Mayweather punched her in the ribs and choked her. The former junior welterweight champion pled not guilty last week and is scheduled for trial on June 1.

Las Vegas coercion law makes it unlawful for someone to use or threaten violence on someone with the intent to compel them to do something that the victim has the right not to do. Equally unlawful is forcing someone to abstain from doing something that they have the right to do. It’s also considered coercion to threaten or hurt the victim’s family or property or to simply intimidate by threats of force.

The penalties for breaking Las Vegas coercion law depend on whether the defendant allegedly used physical force or threatened the immediate use of physical force. If there was none, then it’s just a misdemeanor, carrying up to six months in jail and/or up to a $1,000 fine. But if there was force or the threat thereof, coercion’s a category B felony, punishable by one to six years imprisonment and maybe a $5,000 fine as well.

The Nevada Education Department reports that an increased number of high school students are depressed and engaging in destructive behavior, including smoking marijuana. Nearly forty percent of the students surveyed said they used pot, which is a significant increase from 2007. Experts surmise that these trends are a result of the recession and the kids’ parents’ stress rubbing off on them.

Marijuana sales law in Nevada makes it a category B felony to sell or grow marijuana in the state. (However, if the amount of marijuana in question is one hundred pounds or more, then trafficking law applies instead of marijuana sales law in Nevada.) The penalties for marijuana sales law in Nevada increases with each successive offense:

For a first offense of selling marijuana in Nevada, the defendant usually receives probation and a suspended sentence, but the judge may order one to six years in Nevada State Prison with an optional fine of up to $20,000. A second offense allows the judge to order two to ten years in prison with an optional fine of up to $20,000. And for a third offense, the defendant faces three to fifteen years in prison with the optional $20,000 fine. These sentences may be increased if the defendant allegedly sold to minors or sold near minors.

On Friday, a twenty-year old man driving a pickup was allegedly speeding and ran a red light near Lamb and the Strip. Witnesses reported to police that he struck another car, causing the death of its driver and passenger. After the pickup driver was released from the hospital, he was arrested for two felony counts of breaking Nevada reckless driving law causing death.

Any person who drives in willful or wanton disregard of the safety of people or property may be charged with breaking Nevada reckless driving law (NRS 484.348). As long as no one gets hurt or killed, it's a misdemeanor punishable by a fine between $250 and $1,000 or up to six months in jail. Subsequent offenses for breaking Nevada reckless driving law carry higher fines but still a maximum six months in jail.

If this alleged reckless driving causes death, it's chargeable as a category B felony, carrying one to six years in prison and a fine between $2,000 and $5,000. (Sentences may be increased if the accident took place in a work zone.) However, if it can be shown that the driver wasn't reckless but instead acted out of simple negligence, then the appropriate charge would be vehicular manslaughter, which is punishable as a misdemeanor.

Fifty-seven year-old Steven Farrell, who was arrested in Mesquite on December ninth on suspicion of murdering his fiancée in Benton County, will be extradited back to Indiana. Farrell faces charges of shooting forty-year-old Christine Craig in front of her sixteen-year-old daughter on what was supposed to be their wedding day. Last week Craig appeared before Clark County District Judge Smith on an Indiana governor's warrant. As expected, the judge signed an order granting extradition.

People arrested in Mesquite usually have their initial court appearance in Mesquite Justice Court. However, those arrested within Mesquite's city limits will have their cases heard in Mesquite Municipal Court, which is in the same building. If the case is a felony, then it may be "bound over" to Clark County District Court in downtown, Las Vegas.

Mesquite Justice Court, which is located at 500 Hillside Drive, Mesquite NV 89027, hears criminal proceedings only every other Wednesday, and it does not handle traffic matters. The hours for Mesquite Justice Court are Monday through Thursday, 7:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., and its phone number is (702) 346-5298. The court does not accept bail money, but you can pay bail at the Mesquite Jail, which shares the same address.