Seven LV Valley residents die in weekend shootings

Monday, Feb. 26, 2001 | 11:18 a.m.

SUN STAFF AND WIRE REPORTS

Seven Las Vegas Valley residents were gunned down over the weekend in four separate shootings, including three family members killed after an argument.

Donte Pattison, 21, was in the Clark County jail this morning on three counts of murder.

He is accused of killing his 82-year-old grandfather Yoshio Kato, 75-year-old grandmother Sally Kato and his sister, whose name and age were not available this morning.

Metro Police were called to a house in the 1500 block of Valley Crest near Vegas Drive and Jones Boulevard Saturday about 10:45 p.m. and heard gunshots as they approached the home.

The officers saw a man leave the house, then run back inside when he saw police.

The man, later identified as Pattison, a short time later surrendered to police. He was booked into the jail and was on suicide watch Sunday night.

Pattison's aunt fled the house when the shooting started and ran to a neighbor's house to call police.

A woman started banging on Bill LaFontaine's door screaming that her niece was dead Saturday night.

The woman told him she had just seen a relative shoot her niece in the neck before running out of the house to LaFontaine's home two houses away, he said.

He let the woman inside and called 911.

"I did my best to help her out," LaFontaine said. For the next several hours police were in and out of his home.

Sometime during the early morning hours of the investigation, the coroner told her that her grandparents had also been killed.

"You wouldn't believe the screaming and crying," LaFontaine said. "It was pitiful."

Teens who live next door put a bouquet of flowers and three candles on the front steps of the home.

"They were good neighbors and we thought it was appropriate," Chanelle Baisa, 13, said.

On Sunday about 11:40 a.m. North Las Vegas Police were called to a house in the 2500 block of Raymond Avenue near Martin Luther King Boulevard and Carey Avenue on the report of a man shot.

Police found a 21-year-old man on the ground by the open door of a parked car, Lt. Art Redcay, a department spokesman, said.

The man, whose name was not released this morning, apparently was approached by another man who had just gotten out of a car. The two men talked for a short time, the suspect pulled out a gun and shot the 21-year-old man, Redcay said.

On Saturday about 10:40 p.m. Metro Police were called to Stewart Avenue and 13th Street and found a man dead from multiple gunshot wounds in a parking lot.

Police were searching for 45-year-old Jose Luis Pulido-Guitterez to talk to him about the slaying.

Witnesses told police a man was seen fleeing the area after the shooting. The victim had not been identified as of this morning.

In Tijauna, Mexican authorities were investigating an attack in which a gunman shot and killed two Las Vegas Valley women and took a child from them.

The women were sitting in a parked car Saturday morning in a neighborhood at the northern edge of Tijuana when the gunman approached and shot them at point blank range.

The women's full names were not immediately available, but the Tijuana newspaper Frontera reported that both were residents of Las Vegas and their car had Nevada license plates.

Witnesses told authorities the gunman took the child in a safety seat and several suitcases from the trunk and fled in another car.

One of the women died at the scene and the other at a local hospital.

Police officials told Frontera that they believe the suspect fled to the United States.