Jailhouse informant says he will take Fifth again

Monday, Aug. 14, 2000 | 11:31 a.m.

Jailhouse informant David Gomez planned to assert his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination again if called to the witness stand today in the post-trial Ted Binion murder hearing.

Gomez -- whose testimony has become critical to efforts to win a new trial for Binion's convicted killers, Sandy Murphy and Rick Tabish -- informed District Judge Joseph Bonaventure on Friday that he won't testify without a grant of immunity.

"Mr. Gomez currently is awaiting sentencing on federal charges in the district of Nevada and his involvement in the instant case does present real hazards of incrimination," his lawyer, Michael Cristalli, wrote in court papers.

"Absent a grant of immunity from the state, Mr. Gomez cannot be compelled to testify in this case."

Gomez, a reputed member of the Mexican Mafia, was expected to be called to the witness stand this afternoon.

In February, Gomez took the Fifth Amendment at a pre-trial hearing when questioned about allegations Clark County Detention Center officials planted him next to Tabish to steal his confidential legal papers.

The allegations subsequently fell by the wayside.

But defense attorney William Terry, who represents Tabish, filed court papers last month alleging Gomez had provided his investigator, Jim Thomas, with new information about the alleged plot. Terry is seeking a new trial for Tabish in part because of the accusations raised by Gomez.

On Sunday, Chief Deputy District Attorney David Roger, who helped convict Murphy and Tabish of killing Binion in September 1998, said he has no intention of seeking an immunity order to allow Gomez to testify.

Roger is the subject of the latest allegations of misconduct reportedly raised by Gomez.

The defense contends Gomez gave a jailhouse interview to Thomas May 28 in which he alleged Roger conspired with jail officials to place Gomez in the same protective custody cellblock as Tabish.

Roger has denied there was any such plot, and he has accused Gomez, who's now in federal custody at the North Las Vegas Jail, of lacking credibility.

Gomez, who has multiple felony convictions, faces sentencing on a federal perjury charge that involved an identity scam he pulled off when arrested by FBI agents on bank robbery charges in 1996.

Additionally, a detention center memo obtained by the Sun alleges Gomez told a corrections officer May 30 that he was to be paid to trash Roger. During the murder trial, prosecutors had accused Tabish of paying off witnesses to provide him with an alibi in Binion's slaying.

In the memo, corrections officer Dante Tromba said Gomez told him that Thomas had approached him about giving a statement linking Roger to the purported plot to plant Gomez next to Tabish.

"Inmate Gomez stated that he intended on doing it because he wanted to get paid and he felt that he was getting f - - - - - by us," Tromba wrote.

The officer added that Gomez said Thomas also wanted him to go on NBC's "Dateline" television news magazine show and raise the allegations.

Terry has acknowledged that Gomez may have a credibility problem, but he contends his allegations are corroborated by other witnesses, including some of his former jailers.

In his court papers, meanwhile, Cristalli said Gomez shouldn't even be forced to assert his Fifth Amendment privilege on the stand.

"If the court wishes to evaluate the facts in support of Mr. Gomez' invocation of the privilege," Cristalli said, "it is requested that the court order Mr. Gomez to file a statement under seal for this court's in camera review to determine whether he was justified in refusing to answer each question posed by defendant Tabish."