News briefs for Jan. 14, 2003

Tuesday, Jan. 14, 2003 | 11:10 a.m.

Police say suspects were barricaded

Three people suspected of being connected to a car theft were arrested Tuesday after barricading themselves in a downtown apartment for about five hours.

Two neighbors were also cited for allegedly helping the suspects dispose of evidence.

Officer Jose Montoya said a man whose vehicle was stolen called Metro Police when he saw someone driving his car. Officers spotted the car about 8:30 a.m. in a parking lot. They saw several people standing near it, and watched them go into an apartment in the 1100 block of South Casino Center Drive.

Officers knocked on the door, but no one answered. They heard the occupants place objects in front of the door, and they heard them speaking to their next door neighbors through a wall. Montoya said the neighbors were helping them get rid of drugs that were in the apartment.

Police obtained a search warrant and entered the apartment about 1:30 p.m. They arrested Michael Lasker, 34; Joseph Kearns, 25; and Angela Montgomery, 23, for possession of a stolen vehicle, destroying evidence and obstructing police. Montgomery was also charged with grand larceny.

The neighbors, James Trippied, 24, and Steven Lucio, no age given, were cited for obstructing police, Montoya said.

Woman struck by car in NLV

A 36-year-old North Las Vegas woman was in fair condition at University Medical Center after she was struck by a car about 5:30 p.m. Monday.

North Las Vegas Police officers discovered Alicia Lopez unconscious in the westbound lane of Cheyenne Avenue.

A 1997 Chevrolet Corvette had stopped nearby with a crushed windshield.

Steve Wehby, also of North Las Vegas, the driver of the car, was not injured, police said.

Traffic investigators said Lopez was crossing Cheyenne on foot, outside a crosswalk from a bus stop when Wehby's vehicle struck her, police said.

At this point in the investigation, pedestrian error is the only known contributing factor to the cause the accident, but investigators are continuing to examine the evidence, Lt. Paul Womack, traffic division commander, said.

Life terms handed down in rape

Four men who pleaded guilty to the kidnapping and the sexual assault of a 19-year-old woman were each given two concurrent life sentences in prison by District Judge Kathy Hardcastle on Monday.

Daniel McDaris, 17, Alexander Berrillos, 20, and brothers Sergio Chan, 17, and Oscar Chan, 15, pleaded guilty in October to the Halloween night 2001 kidnapping and sexual assault. They also pleaded guilty to robbery charges and conspiracy charges.

Metro Police said the Chan brothers kidnapped a fitness trainer at gunpoint outside a local fitness center and forced her into her Dodge Neon, which they stole. She was sexually assaulted and then tied up and forced into the trunk of her car, police said.

The brothers then picked up McDaris and Berrillos. The woman was sexually assaulted by the group before being left at Washington Avenue and Los Feliz Street, police said.

McDaris and Berrillos will be eligible for parole after 14 years, Oscar Chan after 19 years and Sergio Chan after 24 years.

Video-game store robbers sought

The Metro Police robbery section is looking for the public's help in identifying three men who robbed a video game store near Cheyenne Avenue and Las Vegas Boulevard North about 1:30 p.m. Dec. 16.

The robbers stole more than $12,000 worth of video games and machines. Police describe the men as between 18 and 25 years old and 6 feet tall with thin builds. One of the men had a shaved head and wore a black leather jacket and dark pants. The second robber had short black hair and was unshaven, wearing a gray and white sweatshirt and dark pants. The third wore a dark sweatshirt and dark pants.

They may be driving a gold Dodge Intrepid. They should be considered armed and dangerous.

Anyone with information is asked to call the robbery section at 229-3591 or Secret Witness at 385-5555.

Berkley, Gibbons are on the road

Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., on Monday began a weeklong trip to Taiwan to examine security in East Asia.

Berkley, a member of the International Relations Committee, is traveling with six other House members. She is scheduled to meet with Taiwanese security officials and politicians, including President Chen Shui-bian. Berkley plans to attend the four-day Inter-Parliamentary Conference on Asian Pacific Security, which likely will focus in large part on North Korea. She is speaking on a panel that will examine the relationship between Japan, Taiwan and the United States.

Berkley, who is being accompanied by her husband, Larry Lehrner, will return Sunday. The government of Taiwan paid for their trip.

With the House in recess this week, Rep. Jim Gibbons, R-Nev., is also traveling. He's in Africa on a terrorism fact-finding mission for the House Intelligence Committee.

Museum names new director

The Nevada State Museum and Historical Society has appointed Greta Brunschwyler as the museum's new director.

Brunschwyler started her new job on Jan. 2.

Formerly the director of the Novata History Museum and Supervisor of Cultural Arts in Novato, Calif., Brunschwyler is an executive board member of the Western Museums Association.

She has also held positions at the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History, the San Diego Museum of Man and the Southern Oregon Historical Society.

The exhibits of the Nevada State Museum and Historical Society in Lorenzi Park include: an Ice Age Columbian Mammoth; a 48-foot carved fossil relief of the largest known animal to live in Nevada, the Berlin State Park Ichthyosaur; and a tribute to the World War II-era Las Vegas Army Gunnery School.

Desert Inn Road will be closed

from Paradise Road to Swenson Street from 9 a.m to 6 p.m. daily through Friday. It will be open Saturday and Sunday but will be closed again, for the same hours, Monday through Jan. 24. The closing is to allow for construction of the Convention Center station of the Las Vegas Monorail.