Wednesday, May 10, 2006 | 7:26 a.m.
Marcus Dixon is 22 years old and has spent more than one-third of his life behind bars.
Incarcerated for a crime he committed at age 14 - murder with a deadly weapon - Dixon is supposed to spend at least 40 years in prison.
Unless he gets lucky next month, when the Nevada Board of Pardons hears Dixon's request for a reduced sentence. The June 7 hearing will be at the state Supreme Court in Carson City.
Dixon fatally shot Daryl Crittenden outside a Las Vegas supermarket in May 1998. The 14-year-old murder defendant was offered and refused a plea bargain with a prison term of 10-25 years. He was tried as an adult and sentenced to two consecutive prison terms - one for a firearm's enhancement - of 20 years to life.
Dixon's attorney, Kristina Wildeveld, argues that the teenager was too young to appreciate what chain of events would unfold after the trigger was pulled. He was unable to conceive of spending even 10 years in jail at the time he was charged, and wrongly thought he could beat the charges. Had he been older, Wildeveld says, Dixon would have accepted the plea bargain.
"It is not buyer's remorse that makes Marcus now wish that he would have taken a deal nearly nine years ago. He realizes that he needed to pay for his mistakes. Marcus does not view himself as above the law nor that he should have escaped punishment," Wildeveld says in a petition for commutation of Dixon's sentence.
Wildeveld wants the sentence commuted to match the district attorney's initial offer - 10 to 25 years - or, at the very least, have the two sentences run concurrently for a total of 20 years.
The decision falls to the nine-member board, consisting of Nevada's governor, attorney general and Supreme Court justices. The board typically meets twice a year, and chose to review Dixon's case from more than 600 inmates requesting a June hearing, board program officer Shelly Williams said.
Board members will review a series of documents detailing Dixon's case and time served, including any certificates of accomplishment Dixon may have earned behind bars and a letter of input from the district attorney, Williams said. They may also hear from family members of Dixon and the victim.
The Clark County district attorney's office has not completed the board letter and is not yet prepared to discuss any stance on the possible shortening of Dixon's sentence, said Steve Owens, capital case coordinator for the district attorney's office.
It is likely, however, that the letter will address the issue of Dixon's age, to remind board members that it was well known to the judge and jury that convicted him, Owens said.
"We typically prefer to abide by the jury's verdict than have the Pardons Board step in years later," he said. "We believe pardons should be for extraordinary situations."
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