Woman gets 12 years for 1994 slaying

Bill Gang

Friday, May 8, 1998 | 10:11 a.m.

A Las Vegas woman whose conviction and life prison sentence for her role in the 1994 slaying of a jewelry salesman were overturned last year by the Nevada Supreme Court is headed back to prison.

But this time, Claudia Canada, 26, will be eligible for parole after five years, not the 20 years she would have served for her prior conviction on first-degree murder charges.

She already has served nearly four years jail time.

Canada pleaded guilty March 19 to second-degree murder and robbery for her part in the June 26, 1994, slaying of 69-year-old Harold "Dice" Goodwine during a scheme to steal his jewels.

On Thursday, District Judge Joseph Bonaventure sentenced Canada to a 12-year prison term for the murder and four years for the robbery, but ordered them to be served at the same time. Under Nevada law, no matter whether the sentence for the slaying is a term of years or life, five years must be served before eligibility for parole.

In addition to the prison time, Bonaventure ordered Canada to pay $1,800 in restitution.

Canada's co-defendant, Gary Scherer, 45, is scheduled to stand trial on open murder charges Sept. 14. He also had been convicted of first-degree murder at the original trial but was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

The pair's convictions were overturned because a juror failed to tell trial attorneys that his father had been a murder victim.

A third defendant, 32-year-old Ann Schuck, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder early in the case and became a prosecution witness.

She had testified that she was with Canada at Goodwine's apartment in the Country Club Towers, 850 E. Desert Inn Road, and saw her hit the man with a frying pan and then stab him to death while holding a pillow over his face.

Scherer, Goodwine's business associate who was alleged to have orchestrated the slaying, was in a Henderson bar at the time of the murder.