Cook pleads guilty to killing his wife

Bill Gang

Friday, July 2, 1999 | 10:40 a.m.

A civilian cook at Nellis Air Force Base has admitted he stabbed his wife repeatedly with a butcher knife and then stabbed his 10-year-old stepdaughter when she tried to protect her mother.

Joseph Michael Smith, 32, pleaded guilty Thursday to murder and child abuse charges in a deal that will put him in prison for 30 years before he is eligible for parole.

Trivia Smith died from the nearly 20 stab wounds she suffered moments after she called 911 to complain that her husband was abusing her and that he had a knife.

"Don't do it, baby," the victim could be heard pleading on the 911 call before the attack began in the early 1998 incident.

Deputy District Attorney Abbi Silver said that the victim's screams were heard over the open telephone line.

Although the girl was wounded in the back and on her arms as she tried to shield her mother from the knife blows and spent five days in a hospital, she has recovered except for the scars.

Deputy Public Defender Curtis Brown said Joseph Smith was in a "blind rage" as he stabbed at his wife, and the girl's injuries were simply the result of "out-of-control hacking."

Smith is not the father of the injured girl and her 12-year-old brother. Their father, according to Silver, is in prison for stabbing Trivia Smith while they were still married.

The prosecutor conceded the victim had been involved in abusive relationships in the past.

In the plea bargain, Joseph Smith will be sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole after 20 years for the murder and 5 to 20 years on two child abuse counts. The defendant agreed the sentences will run consecutively, or one after the other.

Formal sentencing for Smith is set for Aug. 12 in District Judge John McGroarty's courtroom.