JP weighs evidence in killing of driving instructor

Jace Radke

Wednesday, Oct. 30, 2002 | 9:24 a.m.

During a two-day preliminary hearing that ended Tuesday, prosecutors alleged that 19-year-old Anthony Prentice masterminded and then carried out a plan to kill a man who Prentice said helped him more than anyone else in his life.

Prentice and co-defendant James Harrison, 21, will have to wait until Nov. 6 to learn if Justice of the Peace Nancy Oesterle will find that there is enough evidence to try them for the August 2002 murder of Dan Miller, 58.

Miller was found dead in his apartment near Harmon Avenue and Paradise Road, stabbed 128 times and a swastika carved into his back.

Metro Police detectives, a security guard and a 17-year-old girl who allegedly was with Prentice and Harrison over a three-day period at the end of August that included the night Miller was murdered all testified before Oesterle.

Metro homicide Detective Dan Long testified that during interviews Prentice and Harrison blamed each other for the murder.

"James said that he was involved and that Anthony was also involved in the murder, and Anthony said that James did it on his own," Long said. "James said that Anthony got in an argument with Dan (Miller) then tackled him and began stabbing him.

"James said he saw that and then went over and covered Dan's mouth and put him in a headlock so Anthony could continue stabbing him to death."

Prentice, had been living with Miller, a driving instructor who vouched for Prentice at a parole violation hearing in February. Prentice was originally placed on five years' probation in Sept. 2001 after pleading guilty to his part in an uprising at the Summit View Youth Correctional Center in North Las Vegas.

The exact relationship between Prentice and Miller is not known, but Long testified that when interviewed that Prentice said Miller offered to pay him to let Miller perform oral sex. Long said that Prentice told him the offer was only made once, and was not brought up again.

The 17-year-old girl testified that she met Prentice through her friend Harrison two days before Miller was killed. She testified that she was Prentice's girlfriend and that he asked her to marry him and she said yes.

She also told Oesterle that Prentice brought up the idea of killing Miller and taking his money and car. She said that Prentice and Harrison talked about ways they could kill Miller, settling on using a knife and hammer.

In exchange for her testimony and a plea of guilty to accessory to murder, the 17-year-old will not be certified as an adult for the purposes of her sentencing.

Long said that Prentice told him that he was affiliated with a skinhead group and with a white supremacist group known as the National Socialist Regime.

"He said that the NRS was a powerful organization, and that if there was a swastika carved into Miller's forehead or back the group was trying to frame him," Long said. "We hadn't told him about the swastika prior to that."

Defense attorneys Paul Wommer and Bret Whipple called no witnesses during the hearing, but did ask Oesterle to drop a robbery charge against Prentice and Harrison.

"The only evidence that there was a robbery is that there was no wallet or money found at the apartment, but many people don't carry wallets," Whipple said. "Many people don't have money with them all the time, so that doesn't prove anything."

Oesterle said she would consider the robbery charge and would not rule on the murder charge separately, so she passed the decision until Nov. 6.