Accused killer’s girlfriend found

Bill Gang

Friday, Oct. 1, 1999 | 11:24 a.m.

Charla Severs always was considered a key prosecution witness against her ex-boyfriend, the teenager charged as the triggerman in the execution slayings of four young men a year ago.

But early this year the girl known as "La La" disappeared without a word or a trace and even her parents believed "the word on the street" that she had been killed to ensure she wouldn't appear at Donte Johnson's trial.

Severs surfaced in Manhattan on Sept. 17 and now is sitting in the Clark County Detention Center as a material witness for Johnson's Jan. 10 trial.

Deputy District Attorney Gary Guymon stated in court documents filed Thursday that Severs admitted this week that she fled Nevada after being threatened by a man with a violent past who was connected to Johnson.

"Severs believed the threats were serious because she personally knows the persons involved and their deadly capacity," the prosecutor said.

Guymon said he "knows of a prior homicide that (the man) and Johnson participated in together," referring to the slaying of a drug dealer at a Las Vegas Boulevard motel that occurred a few days before the quadruple murder.

Guymon said Severs claimed she fled because she "was threatened because she did not want to cooperate with Donte Johnson and continue to lie on his behalf."

The prosecutor conceded that Severs had given contradictory stories to police and Clark County grand juries. After implicating Johnson in the quadruple murder during her grand jury testimony on Sept. 15, 1998, she attempted to recant the story in a letter she authored.

Two months after she testified she sent the letter to a television station claiming that she was the one at the murder scene, not Johnson.

In Thursday's court motion, Guymon asked District Judge Jeff Sobel for permission to videotape a deposition of Severs because of her long disappearance and the evidence of threats against her.

"The purpose is to record, preserve and perpetuate the testimony of Severs in the event that her attendance cannot be obtained for a jury trial," the court motion stated.

A hearing on the issue is set for Oct. 11.

Since her disappearance, two other defendants -- Sikia Smith, 19, and Terrell Cochise Young, 20 -- have been convicted of first-degree murder for their roles in the Aug. 14, 1998, quadruple slaying. Both men were sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Smith and Young, however, had confessed to Metro Police homicide detectives.

Johnson hasn't, although he has been connected to the multiple murder through a fingerprint and DNA on a pair of his pants that also carried the blood of one victim.

Severs is said to have been present when the plot was hatched to rob the victims' home of a cache that was believed to include $6,000 in cash and a large quantity of drugs.

The raid on the house near Nellis Boulevard and Tropicana Avenue netted only about $200, a VCR, a video game system and a few pills.

Before leaving, one of the bandits -- prosecutors allege it was Johnson -- stood over each duct-taped and gagged victim and fired single bullets into the back of their heads.

Young and Smith, in their confessions, also said Johnson killed the four men, but those statements are not legally admissible at Johnson's trial. Neither Young or Smith would agree to testify against their friend, although offers of leniency were dangled by prosecutors.

The reason for Severs' disappearance and the reluctance of others to become prosecution witnesses may be evident in letters sent by the murder defendants to each other, according to court documents filed Thursday.

Those letters were seized about two weeks ago from their cells at the county jail because they were considered gang-related contraband.

Court documents indicate there were references to arranged retaliation against any inmates who might come forward or those outside the jail who would testify.

One letter from Johnson stated that he "took care of ... three little white boys" to ensure their silence, although one of those -- Johnson's ex-roommate Ace Hart -- already had testified at Young's trial and is scheduled as a witness at Johnson's trial.

In one letter to Young, Johnson referred to a person he said was working for the police.

Court documents indicate that Johnson told Young not to worry about him because Johnson has "paperwork on him and he is as good as 'dropped off.' "

The four victims in the house on Terra Linda Avenue were Jeffrey Biddle, 19, Tracey Gorringe, 20, Matthew Mowen, 19, and Peter Talamantez, 17.

If Johnson is convicted of first-degree murder for his role, the same jury will have to decide if the appropriate punishment is the death sentence or life in prison with or without the possibility of parole.

Prosecutors also sought the death penalty for Smith and Young, but the juries that convicted them declined to hand down the ultimate penalty for those who didn't fire the fatal bullets.