Las Vegas Sun

March 29, 2024

Teen testifies in murder trial

Sixteen-year-old Mark Ford was good at breaking into people's homes.

He could usually determine whether residents were home and he was generally successful at prying open sliding glass doors and petting dogs so barking wouldn't alert their owners.

But when the teen tried to break into Vincent Gomes' home on Feb. 24, 2003, things went horribly wrong, Ford told jurors Wednesday during his murder trial before District Judge Joseph Bonaventure.

Ford said he was trying to climb through an open bathroom window of the home in a gated community near Grand Canyon Drive and Sahara Avenue when Gomes, 56, grabbed him and pulled him into the house.

"He said, 'Why are you breaking in my house? What are you doing here?' " Ford said. "He was angry and mad. He was yelling."

Ford said Gomes, a former security guard at Bally's, dragged him through the house and into the kitchen and pinned him against the kitchen sink while he tried to call police.

"I was scared and I didn't know what he was going to do," Ford said. "I didn't want to go to jail. I'd never been in this situation before."

Ford said a combination of fear and panic led him to reach for the handle of a knife that was in the kitchen sink and stab Gomes once in the neck. He said he didn't intend to kill Gomes.

"I just wanted to get out of there," Ford said, putting his head down and crying. "I never wanted to kill him. I just wanted to hurt him or something."

The 16-year-old's testimony came on the third day of his murder trial in Bonaventure's courtroom. Ford faces murder and other felony charges in the slaying.

Prosecutors say Ford broke into the home to rob it and violently attacked Gomes when he discovered him home. Ford's fingerprints were found in the Gomes home and blood was found on Ford's clothing.

Ford was 15 at the time of the killing. He faces a sentence of life in prison with or without parole if convicted.

On the witness stand Wednesday, the teen admitted to committing a string of other burglaries and burglary attempts in the northwest area, saying he often broke into homes in search of money or other things.

On one occasion, Ford said, he broke into a house and ran into the owner, who asked him why he was in her home. Ford told the woman he was trying to use her bathroom.

The day of the Gomes slaying, Ford said he had tried to break into other homes in the Wellington Park community, where he used to live, but was unsuccessful.

He was trying to pry open Gomes' sliding door with a garden tool when he noticed the metal latches were up on a nearby bathroom window, he said.

"When I try to get into houses, that's how I know if a window is open or not," he said. "I don't like to kick in doors or anything."

Ford said he had dropped the garden tool during his struggle with Gomes, and that Gomes had picked up the tool and was pointing it in his direction while ordering him not to move away from the sink. When Gomes reached for the phone, Ford said, the teen reached for the knife.

"I grabbed the handle, I took a step forward and I stabbed Mr. Gomes," Ford testified.

Ford said he ran through the house and into the garage, where he fumbled around in the dark in search for an electric garage door opener. He said he'd opened the garage when he noticed he'd left his knit cap inside the house.

"I stepped (back into) the house and I stepped on something wet," he said. "I seen blood on the floor."

Gomes was lying on the floor nearby making "a gurgling type noise," Ford said.

The teen said he took off the soiled shoe and hopped with one foot through the house to retrieve his hat. He exited the home through the sliding glass door and left the neighborhood on his moped.

Ford said he had been stabbed himself a few years before the Gomes killing during a confrontation with a boy who was one year older than him. In that case, the other teen stabbed Ford in the back, puncturing one of his lungs, Ford said.

"I thought I was going to die," Ford said of the prior stabbing.

Closing arguments in the case were expected to begin today.

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