Las Vegas Sun

November 26, 2009

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Supreme Court rejects killer’s appeal

By Cy Ryan (contact)

Wednesday, Oct. 7, 2009 | 4:36 p.m.

CARSON CITY – The Nevada Supreme Court has rejected the appeal of Las Vegas killer Jack D. Getz, who says he withheld testimony during his 2000 trial because of threats to his family’s safety.

The court upheld District Court Judge Jackie Glass, who denied the petition and the motion for a new trial from Getz, who was sentenced to prison to a life term without possibility of parole.

Getz, now 64 and housed at the Northern Nevada Correctional Center in Carson City, was convicted of fatally shooting Rayburn Ware four times at close range in a parking lot on Christmas night.

Testimony at the trial showed Getz, a trained private detective, was unhappy that his daughter was dating Ware, who was the likely father of her unborn child.

In his new petition, Getz, also known as Jack D. King, says his trial attorney was ineffective for failing to stop threats to the family’s safety and that forced Getz not to testify to the whole truth.

The court said Getz failed to show why this argument was not raised in prior appeals. It said his petition was “procedurally defective.”

Getz also said he was trying to exhaust his claims in the state courts so he can appeal to the federal system. The Supreme Court said that was “not good cause” for raising this argument nine years after his conviction.

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