Man who killed girlfriend gets life with possibility of parole

Bill Gang

Friday, Feb. 11, 2000 | 10:44 a.m.

A defense memorandum at the sentencing of admitted killer David Wayne Crawford took the odd approach of attacking the character of the victim -- his on-again, off-again girlfriend.

District Judge Jeff Sobel on Thursday asked in indignation just how the disparaging memorandum was supposed to help the defendant, but neither Crawford or his attorney, Scott Bindrup, had an answer.

Deputy District Attorney Brian Kochever chastised Bindrup and asked the judge to hand down the toughest sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole.

But in the end, Sobel gave a lighter sentence of life with the possibility of parole after 40 years has been served. The death penalty was not a possibility under the plea bargain.

The defendant did not speak in his own behalf.

Crawford, 33, had pleaded guilty to first-degree murder with the use of a deadly weapon for the slaying of 26-year-old Gloria Joann Dugan in her southeast Las Vegas home in April 1997. She had been shot six times and her body wasn't found until co-workers went to her house after she failed to show up for work.

Crawford sometimes shared the home at 7077 Orange Grove Lane, near Tamarus Street and Warm Springs Road.

The case drew controversy last year after Sobel permitted Crawford to have his freedom on $360,000 bail to spend the holidays with his aging parents before the sentencing, but then reversed his position and ordered Crawford to await sentencing behind bars.

Sobel had ordered Crawford back to jail so he wouldn't have a chance to flee before the sentencing, since even the lightest sentence required him to serve the next 40 years behind bars.

At that hearing, Bindrup accused the judge of bending to media pressure, sending Sobel into an angry outburst of denial.

The judge said he couldn't live with his conscience if Crawford fled or something happened before sentencing.

Sobel said the jailing wasn't a "doublecross" and it wasn't "playing for the cameras" that were in court recording the events.

"If you play to the cameras, you're a moron," the judge said.

Crawford's case had dragged on for more than two years before the guilty plea in what prosecutors contended was a concerted effort to delay the inevitable.

Crawford had waived his Justice Court preliminary hearing in 1997 and indicated that he was going to plead guilty to charges after spending Christmas of that year with his family.

But he did not follow through with the deal and instead pleaded not guilty. A later delay in the trial until Aug. 30, 1999, allowed him to spend another Christmas at home.

Then, as his time was running out, he finally accepted the plea bargain with the understanding that he could spend one last Christmas as a free man -- although Sobel cut that short.