Judge denies retrial for Floyd

Kim Smith

Monday, Aug. 21, 2000 | 11:47 a.m.

A Las Vegas man who gunned down five people in a local grocery store last summer will not get a new trial.

District Judge Jeffrey Sobel agreed with District Attorney Stewart Bell, saying that all of the issues defense attorneys cited in asking for a new trial were addressed during Zane Floyd's June trial.

Public defenders Curtis Brown and Doug Hedger wanted a new trial because they believed jurors were influenced by a variety of factors.

They argued prosecutors made inappropriate comments during their closing statements, that Sobel erred when he allowed certain people to testify and that one family member was allowed to testify about irrelevant matters.

Hedger and Brown also believe the media influenced the jury.

Floyd, 24, was sentenced to death in July for walking into a Las Vegas grocery store in June 1999 and shooting everyone he came across. Four people were killed and a fifth was critically wounded.

Floyd told police he joined the military and committed the murders because he had always wanted to know what it was like to kill someone.

In their motion for a new trial, the defense attorneys said prosecutors went too far when they told jurors that Floyd committed "the worst massacre in the history of Las Vegas."

They also complained that Bell committed "the most flagrant and outrageous case of prosecutorial misconduct" when he asked jurors, "When would the death penalty be appropriate if not in this case?"

Bell and Chief Deputy District Attorney Bill Koot also asked the jury to compare the Floyd case to other murder cases even though they knew two other death penalty cases had been or were being tried around the same time.

The jurors may have returned a verdict of death against Floyd, who killed four people, because they were aware through media reports that jurors in the Fernando Hernandez case returned a verdict of death when he killed only one person, his wife, the defense attorneys said.

The defense attorneys also said that many of the people who were unharmed during the rampage should not have been allowed to give victim impact statements during the penalty phase. Only the statements of those related to the victims were relevant, the attorneys argue.

In addition, one of the victim's mothers was allowed to speak about her son's kidnapping years before, which probably influenced the jurors as well, the defense attorneys argued.

Floyd is scheduled to be formally sentenced Aug. 31.