Court briefs for September 8, 2000

Friday, Sept. 8, 2000 | 11:43 a.m.

10-year sentence handed down

A Las Vegas man who was beaten by a group of bar patrons after he tried to take them hostage during a June robbery was sentenced to 10 years in prison Thursday.

Brian Kennison, 24, will have to serve at least 26 months in prison before he will be eligible for parole.

According to police, Kennison walked into the PT's Pub on South Nellis Boulevard in the early morning hours of June 19 to try to rob it.

Someone activated an alarm, however, and police negotiators and a tactics team quickly responded.

Several patrons took matters into their own hands though and jumped Kennison when he ordered a woman to disrobe at gunpoint and tried to sexually assault her.

Former teacher wants job back

A former Clark County School District middle school teacher has filed a wrongful dismissal lawsuit against the district.

According to a lawsuit filed Thursday in District Court, Angelo Eugene Lafasto received a letter from Assistant Superintendent George Ann Rice in March asking him to clarify why FBI reports show he has an arrest record when he wrote on his application he has never been arrested, charged or convicted of a felony.

Lafasto told Rice that the charges were dismissed and the records expunged, but offered to resign immediately if the district felt it had been misled.

Rice did not take him up on the offer and told him that should the district want Lafasto to resign it would formulate its own resignation letter, the lawsuit states.

One month later, after Lafasto believed his offer had expired and the district had still failed to write its own letter of resignation, Lafasto was told his resignation had been accepted, the lawsuit states.

Lafasto is seeking to regain his position at Garrett Middle School and receive back pay dating to April 28.

Guilty plea can't be retracted

A 24-year-old Compton, Calif., man was sentenced to 10 to 25 years in prison Thursday in the November shooting death of a Las Vegas man.

Brian Dion Sims admitted in July that the state had enough evidence to prove that he shot and killed Charles Clark Jr. on Nov. 23, 1999.

Sims tried to back out of the plea agreement Thursday, saying that another man shot Clark, but District Judge Joseph Bonaventure refused to allow him to do so.

Bonaventure noted that Sims had earlier tried to blame his own brother for the shooting despite the statements of three eyewitnesses who identified him as the shooter.

Clark, 25, the former boyfriend of Sims' brother's girlfriend, was shot after words were exchanged at the girlfriend's house.

State settles suit against NHP

An off-duty kissing incident between two Nevada Highway Patrol troopers at a Las Vegas conference has resulted in a $260,000 out-of-court settlement favoring the female trooper.

The state Board of Examiners agreed Thursday to pay Sgt. Patricia Kinard $60,000 and her attorney, Jack Kennedy, $200,000 to settle three suits charging sexual retaliation by the patrol. The board also reinstated her sergeant's rank.

Kinard had originally been demoted and suspended when an NHP investigation concluded that she had been the aggressor in the 1996 kissing incident with Trooper Mark Ford.

Reacting to her lawsuits the state formed two focus groups and conducted four mock trials to gauge what a jury might conclude. These exercises revealed that Kinard was believable and that Ford's story was not credible.

Bankruptcy leads to many charges

A federal indictment charges a Las Vegas man with 73 counts of money laundering and filing false financial statements for allegedly trying to hide assets after filing for bankruptcy.

Michael A. Long is also charged with concealment of assets, conspiracy, filing false federal employee tax returns and attempting to evade and defeat tax laws.

According to the indictment, Long owned two roofing businesses and a horse ranch when he filed for bankruptcy in 1994. But he failed to disclose his interest in the horse ranch and other assets when he filled out the bankruptcy forms, the indictment says.

Long also allegedly had an accountant deposit money in various bank accounts he did not disclose to federal bankruptcy officials. Long is also accused of underreporting the wages paid to employees of the roofing companies and filing false income tax returns between 1993 and 1996.