Another alleged 311 Boyz tape released

Erica D. Johnson

Thursday, Sept. 11, 2003 | 11:16 a.m.

A second videotape of the 311 Boyz shows several alleged gang members swarming around a car full of teenagers after a fight in a Las Vegas parking lot, an act police say is reminiscent of a violent attack on a 17-year-old boy in a Summerlin neighborhood.

The videotape, released this morning, shows two teens fighting in a dimly lit parking lot while about 15 onlookers surround them, cheering them on.

After the brawl, which lasts about three minutes, one of the fighters walks off with several other teens while the teens left behind shout out threats.

As the first group piles into a car, members of the other group surround them, shouting obscenities until one teen reaches through the open window and begins punching a teen inside, the video shows.

The scene ends with the car driving off and several other teens chasing the vehicle through the parking lot as it leaves.

The date stamp on the bottom of the screen says the scene was filmed July 16. Prosecutors and police say Stephen Tanner Hansen was attacked by the 311 Boyz two days later in a similar way. Hansen was severely injured when a rock was thrown through the window of a truck in which he was riding and hit him in the face.

Police say a mob of 40 to 80 teenagers surrounded the vehicle Hansen and his two friends were in and tried to prevent the teens from leaving a party in the gated community of Canyon Terrace.

Nine teens are charged in that attack, including Jeff Hart, 17, Ernest Bradley Aguilar, 17, Steven Gazlay, 18, twins Anthony and Brandon Gallion, 16, Mathew Costello, 17, Christopher Farley, 18, Dominic Harriman, 19, and Scott Morse, 18.

The tape is the second video showing the alleged 311 Boyz engaged in violent combat with other teens.

The first videotape, released earlier this week, shows the teens engaged in similar fistfights in various locations around the Las Vegas Valley. In that tape dozens of teenagers fight each other, some voluntarily.

The nine teens are scheduled to be arraigned Tuesday before District Judge Michael Cherry. District Judge Donald Mosley stepped down from the case Wednesday due to a potential conflict of interest because he and one of the defendants share the same attorney.

Prosecutors are also expected to argue for an increase in the teens' bail next week. Eight of the teens have been released from the Clark County Detention Center on a $40,000 bond and one teen is still in custody at the jail with bail set at the same amount.

Chief Deputy District Attorney Christopher Laurent said he plans to ask Cherry to increase the teens' bail to $500,000.

Lynne Henderson, who teaches criminal law at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas Boyd Law School, said defense attorneys may argue for a change of venue based on the pretrial publicity the case has received.

"The defense would have to show the jury pool so contaminated that they can't get an unbiased jury," she said.

Though the videotape could present several challenges for the defense, she said the evidence does not necessarily mean a "slam dunk" for prosecutors. She likened the videotape to the one in the Rodney King beating, which was videotaped in Los Angeles.

"The defense would likely show jurors the tape repeatedly, slowing it down and pointing out things that contradict things prosecution is arguing," she said. "There are plenty of strategies."

But news of a second videotape angered James "Bucky" Buchanan, Gazlay's attorney, who said the publicity surrounding the first tape would prevent his client from receiving a fair trial.

"I'm going to move to dismiss these tapes because of the pretrial publicity," he said. "It's prejudicial to my client."

Laurent said the delay of the second tape's release was a mixup.

Mosley mistakenly received two copies of the first tape and the clerk's office received two copies of the second tape. Mosley and the clerk's office were supposed to receive one of each.

Laurent said he referred to both tapes when writing his motion.

"This doesn't change anything," he said.

Though the videotapes do not depict the attack on Hansen, Laurent said the tapes show what type of violence the indicted teens are capable of.

A scene on the second tapes, depicts a group of about two dozen teenagers surrounding two teenage boys as they punch and kick each other as onlookers cheer them on. The date imprinted on the video says the film was made July 9.

During the scene in the desert the boys pound each other in the head with their fists and then begin to wrestle each other to the ground in the gravel. The headlights of several cars surrounding them illuminate the boys as they kick up dust.

"They're not doing this to humor us, they're doing it to squash a beef," the person holding the camera shouts to the crowd.

After about six minutes of combat, the teens fighting appear exhausted and slump over one another, still on the gravel.

"I think they're done," the person holding the camera shouts.

"If you break them up they're going to fall over," another teen says.

Still, others in the crowd encourage the teens to keep fighting. One teen manages to throw in one last punch before the camera fades to another scene.

Laurent said he is unsure where the scenes in the second tape were filmed.

In one report, however, an officer says a desert area near Centennial Parkway and the Las Vegas Beltway known, as the basin, was a "popular spot for younger people in the valley." It was not clear whether the scene on the second tape was filmed there.

In the incident documented in the police report, a group of teens gathered in the area and one was attacked with a crowbar. Gazlay and Adam "Taz" Henry, 23, face battery charges in that attack.