Killer pleads guilty before new trial

Kim Smith

Friday, March 31, 2000 | 10:48 a.m.

A convicted double murderer who was granted a new trial three years ago agreed to plead guilty in the case Thursday.

Carl Lee Martin pleaded guilty to two counts of second-degree murder in the April 1992 deaths of Joseph Smith III and his wife, Vikki.

Martin will be sentenced by District Judge John McGroarty on May 11. He faces two life sentences with a possibility of parole after five years on each. Whether the sentences will be served at the same time or stacked on top of one another will be determined by the judge.

McGroarty will also have to decide whether the sentences should be served at the same time as the sentence Martin received as the result of a crime committed in prison. The nature of that crime was not made clear at Thursday's hearing.

Martin was accused along with Ronald Ducksworth Jr. of shooting the Smiths three times in the head each, sexually assaulting Vikki Smith and stealing jewelry and other items from their home.

The two men were tried together, but when two witnesses testified that Duckworth told them an unnamed individual actually killed Vikki Smith, Martin's attorneys asked District Judge Sally Loehrer to sever the trials because the jury might assume that unnamed person was Martin.

Loehrer declined to do so, Martin was convicted and the Nevada Supreme Court eventually overturned Martin's conviction and granted him a new trial.

Ducksworth is serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole.