Strohmeyer to get rehearing in slaying

Bill Gang

Wednesday, Jan. 19, 2000 | 11:13 a.m.

Jeremy Strohmeyer, who pleaded guilty to killing 7-year-old Sherrice Iverson, will return to Las Vegas to testify about the events leading to the plea bargain that put him in prison for life.

His New York attorney, Camille Abate, contends that the 21-year-old convict was manipulated into pleading guilty to raping and strangling Iverson by his high-profile Los Angeles attorney, Leslie Abramson, and Las Vegas attorney Richard Wright.

Abate contends that Strohmeyer and his family weren't given accurate information about the laws, his possible punishments and his appeal rights if he were to stand trial. They say Strohmeyer was misled into believing the best result would still result in a life sentence with no parole.

District Judge Joseph Bonaventure said he would hear testimony Feb. 8 from Strohmeyer, his mother, Winifred Strohmeyer, Abramson, Wright and Metro Police homicide detectives.

But the judge ruled Tuesday that there will be no testimony over the defense claim that new evidence has surfaced pointing to Strohmeyer's buddy David Cash as the girl's killer, although attorneys will be free to argue the issue.

The information came from Iverson's father, Leroy Iverson, who said he recalled bumping into Cash outside the women's restroom at a Primm casino on May 25, 1997, just before his daughter's body was found propped on a toilet seat.

The defense claims that Iverson told police of the encounter, but that story was never relayed to defense lawyers as is required by law.

District Attorney Stewart Bell, who prosecuted Strohmeyer, fumed that videotape evidence from surveillance cameras shows Iverson was mistaken in his recollections.

He chastised Abate for raising the issue without first doing her homework by viewing the available evidence and said she should be made to pay for the state's cost in defending the "absurd" allegations.

Abate's allegation that Strohmeyer was led into the plea bargain by his attorneys when he didn't have a clear recollection of what he had done also defied what Bell said was clear evidence of guilt.

Her claim appears to be based in part on Strohmeyer's guilty plea to sexual assault of a minor using a legal provision that did not require him to admit actual guilt. The plea concedes only that prosecutors could prove their case.

Abate contended that Strohmeyer has no recollection of what he was charged with doing and pleaded guilty based only on what he was told he did.

Bell said that Strohmeyer confessed in detail to police after his arrest and gave information that only the killer would know. He also admitted his wrongdoing to friends before his arrest as he sought funds so he could flee.

Bell said Strohmeyer's "fuzzy memory" during the guilty plea about the sexual assault of the victim before her murder was a "self-serving" tactic to avoid an issue that could be problematic during his years in prison.

Abate suggested Strohmeyer was prompted with the information he needed to confess, but when asked after the hearing about the confessions to friends before his arrest, Abate answered only that she has not yet talked to the friends.