Daughter’s change in story has mother facing murder trial

Mathis Winkler

Thursday, March 21, 2002 | 9:47 a.m.

A Las Vegas woman who claimed she shot her estranged husband in self-defense will have to stand trial on murder charges after her 14-year-old daughter testified that she helped her mother place a knife in her dead father's hand.

"You have an uphill battle ahead," Justice of the Peace Jennifer Togliatti told defense lawyers Wednesday after ruling that sufficient probable cause existed to try 35-year-old Roberta Stevens for the shooting.

Stevens called 911 shortly after she shot her husband, James, on Dec. 27, according to testimony. When Metro Police homicide detectives arrived at her home in the 7000 block of Greenoak Circle, Stevens told them that she had shot her husband after he lunged at her with a kitchen knife. Her daughter supported the story at the time, a police officer testified.

Homicide Detective Barry Jensen also said Stevens had told him that her husband was upset about her relationship with another woman.

"He told her that he was going to cut her hair off so that her lover wouldn't like her," Jensen recalled Stevens telling him.

Stevens was arrested on Feb. 9 at the Indian Springs Air Force Base, where she was training with the Army Reserve, after her daughter told police that her mother had asked her to get the knife.

"We were looking for a bat to put in his hands," the 14-year-old testified. When she was unable to find the bat, her mother then asked the teen to grab a knife from the kitchen and pick it up with a jacket in order not to leave any fingerprints. She added that she did not see her mother place the knife in her father's hand.

Stevens' daughter said she held back the truth because she didn't want to lose both of her parents. She added that her father had physically abused her mother on several occasions before the shooting, pulling her hair and throwing furniture at her. After leaving the stand, the daughter smiled and waved at her mother, who smiled back.

A crime scene investigator also testified during the hearing that blood patterns on Stevens' hand seemed to indicate that the knife was placed in his hand after the shooting.

Dr. Rexene Worrell, who works for the Clark County coroner's office and conducted the autopsy on Stevens, testified that he would not have been able to hold a knife due to arthritis in his hands.

Deputy Public Defender Will Ewing said his client still planned to argue that she shot her husband to defend herself. He added that the hearing gave him an opportunity to gather information about the case and that he planned to send the forensic evidence out for independent evaluations.

Ewing declined to comment on the daughter's testimony, saying that he was still reviewing it.

Stevens will be arraigned March 27. She remains in custody on $500,000 bail at Clark County Detention Center.