True Crime and News of the Weird from around the Globe

Vegas Nail Salon Killer Sentenced to Up to 25 Years for Killing Beautician

By HardBoiledNews Staff

LAS VEGAS — A woman who fatally ran over a Las Vegas nail salon manager after trying to skip out on a $35 manicure bill has been sentenced to up to 25 years in prison.

Krystal Whipple, 23, had pleaded guilty to second-degree murder after admitting she killed Nhu Nguyen outside Crystal Nails and Spa in Las Vegas in December 2018.

The judge sentenced Whipple to 10 to 25 years in prison for the murder.

Investigators said Whipple tried to pay her bill with a fake credit card and when it was rejected, she told Nguyen she had to go to her car to get some cash, police said.

Instead, Whipple hopped in her black Chevrolet Camaro and began speeding away. Nguyen, who had followed Whipple outside with another store employee, gave chase and jumped in front of the car. Whipple accelerated, striking the beautician, running her over and dragging her across the parking lot, police said.

Cops later said the black Chevrolet Camaro had been stolen from a rental company.

Whipple fled Nevada and headed to California and was eventually arrested a month later in Phoenix, Arizona.

Passenger Leaning Out of Car Dies After Fatally Knocking Woman Off Her Bike

By HardBoiledNews Staff

The men had been racing with others when they knocked the woman off her bike

LAS VEGAS — He got what he deserved.

A man who was hanging out of the passenger window of his pal’s car as they raced through downtown Las Vegas, was killed after fatally knocking a cyclist to the ground and then falling headfirst out of the vehicle and into a lamp post.

Police say the car appeared to have been recklessly racing with other vehicles when it pulled alongside the cyclist, 55-year-old Michelle Weissman. The passenger, 20-year-old Giovanni Medina Barajas, was leaning out of the car and attempted to punch two pedestrians but missed and then collided with Weissman, knocking her to the ground.

He then fell out of the vehicle and crashed head first into the pole. Both Weissman and Barajas were taken to the hospital where they were declared dead.

Rodrigo Cruz was charged with murder

“Senseless is an understatement,” Lt. Raymond Spencer told KSNV-TV. “You have a woman who was out riding her bicycle and they pull up next to her and strike her, causing her to die. It’s an absolute senseless act. There’s no reason behind this that I can tell you why it occurred, other than complete stupidity.”

The driver, 22-year-old Rodrigo Cruz, fled the scene but was later arrested and charged with murder, fleeing the scene and violating his parole.

Passengers from one of the other vehicles returned to the scene and said they had all been out drinking and were heading back to Cruz’s house. When cops found him there, he claimed he only veered to pull Barajas back into the vehicle.

“He never went back to check on him because he was scared since he was on parole and didn’t think Gio was hurt,” the Las Vegas Sun reported, citing the arrest report. “Gio was always doing stupid stuff, but (Cruz) stated he wasn’t intentionally driving in a manner to allow Gio to make contact with any pedestrians or the bicyclist.”

In 2016, Cruz was sentenced to four-to-12 1/2 years in prison for armed robbery and conspiracy to commit robbery. He was released early after getting credit for 285 days of time served.

Paroled Bank Robber Busted in Blackface Las Vegas Casino Heist

By HardBoiledNews Staff

Cameron James Kennedy’s blackface getup apparently fooled no one during a Vegas casino heist

LAS VEGAS — A recently-paroled bank robber got up to old tricks once again when he snapped off his monitoring bracelet, donned blackface makeup and stuck up a Vegas Strip casino.

Cameron James Kennedy, who is white, walked into the New York-New York Hotel and Casino with black makeup smeared on his face and handgun tucked in his waistband and made his way to the cashier’s cage, prosecutors said.

“I want all your hundreds, and don’t mess around,” he told the cashier before leaving the casino in a taxi with more than $23,000, according to a criminal complaint.

Despite his getup, the cashier told cops she did not Kennedy was really black because his skin tone was “off” and “blotchy.”

Kennedy, 26, had been released from a federal prison last June, after serving several years for a pair of bank robberies in 2012.

But in December, he was arrested for trying to pass off a check that had been altered to be payable for $3,000 instead of $300 at another Vegas casino. He was placed under house arrest for violating his parole and ordered to wear an electronic monitoring bracelet.

But in January, he snapped the bracelet to allegedly rip off the New York-New York casino

After the robbery, Kennedy allegedly bought a gold bracelet for $1,500, money orders of more than $1,800 and a $1,000 prepaid debit card ito give to a pal, according to court records

A week later, authorities received a tip fingering Kennedy as the black-faced man who robbed the casino. He was arrested a week after that.

Kennedy is charged with one count of interference with commerce by robbery and faces up to 20 years in prison.

Suspected Serial Killer Targeting Vegas’ Homeless Charged in 4 Shootings

By HardBoiledNews Staff

Joshua Castellon is believed to be the serial killer going after homeless people in Vegas

LAS VEGAS — A suspected serial killer targeting homeless people in Las Vegas has been arrested and charged with fatally shooting two people and wounding two others in what appear to be random attacks, police said.

Joshua Castellon, 26, was initially arrested by the FBI last week on a weapons charge, but has now been charged with murdering two homeless in cold blood as they slept. He has also been charged with two other similar shootings in which the victims survived, the Las Vegas police said.

“The good news is that we have a suspect in custody and we’re relieved that a dangerous person is off the streets,” said Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department Capt. Robert Plummer.

Police say the shootings appeared to be random.

The first fatal shooting occurred in the early morning hours of Jan. 29 when a man was shot to death while sleeping outside a business. Later that morning a second homeless man was taken to a hospital after being shot in the mouth. He lived.

A third man was shot by a passing motorist as he cleaned a car and also survived. Four days later, a surveillance camera captured a man walking up to a homeless man under  bridge and fatally shooting him, police said.

In mid-February, detectives began closing in on Castellon after receiving some tips, contacting his estranged wife who told them she believed her husband had bought a gun in January. When detectives caught up to Castellon, he agreed to come in for an interview.

Castellon was initially arrested after he told detectives he had bought the gun with the intention of selling it to someone else. The handgun believed to have been used in the shootings has not been recovered.

Party Girl Drives Wrong Way, Dances on Hood, Tries to Escape on Kid’s Scooter

By HardBoiledNews Staff

Sabra Bewley

SPARKS, Nevada — What do you mean, the party’s over?

Cops in Nevada were called after an overly celebratory motorist drove the wrong way down the highway then pulled over and began dancing on the hood of her car before trying to make a getaway on child’s scooter.

The police in Sparks say they found Sabra Alise Bewley, 27, pulled 20 yards off the Pyramid Highway on Saturday afternoon, gyrating on the hood of her Jeep Cherokee. Witnesses said she had been driving on the wrong side of the highway just moments earlier.

As officers approached, they saw Bewley dancing wildly and behaving erratically. She then tried to get away from the officers by hopping on a child’s scooter and darting off.

But officers caught up with her and she resisted arrest fighting with two cops as they tried to restrain her.

Not surprisingly, cops say they found drugs in her car and Bewley was charged with driving under the influence, possession of MDMA and resisting arrest.

In March, Bewley was arrested in Carson City for allegedly barging into her ex-boyfriend’s house and threatening his roommate with a knife. Officers at the time reported that Bewley was similarly incoherent and apparently under the influence of drugs.

Woman Missing For 2 Months Found Chained to Nevada Motel Chair

By HardBoiledNews Staff

Mary Bartholomew had been missing for over two months

BEATTY, Nevada —  A mother of four who disappeared in Upstate New York with a man she met on Facebook was found alive after escaping from a Nevada motel where she had been chained to a chair following a terrifying two-month ordeal of abuse, police said.

Mary Bartholomew, 25, was last seen on Aug. 25 in Cortland, New York before going to meet Jon Turner, 23, a man she had recently met online.

After she failed to turn up for work at a local diner and didn’t return home to her four young kids, her family feared the worse and reported her missing. For the next two months, Bartholomew didn’t post anything on social media and her phone was found in her room.

When her car turned up in the Bear Bear Lake area of California, her mother said she feared her daughter was dead.

Police say Turner forced Bartholomew to leave the state after threatening to kill her, beginning a cross-country odyssey of terror that ended in a Nevada town of Beatty near Death Valley.

Jon Turner is charged with repeatedly abusing Bartholomew over the two-month ordeal

On Nov. 2, the Nye County Sheriff’s Department received a call reporting that a woman had been badly beaten at an area motel. When they arrived at the scene, they found Bartholomew who reported that Turner had choked and beaten her into unconsciousness and left her passed out on the street.

When she came to, she said Turner dragger her back to their motel room and handcuffed her to a chair and continued to beat her with a hatchet, cops said.

Eventually she managed to free herself and went to the motel office to ask for help, police said. She later told cops that Turner had repeatedly sexually assaulted her during the two weeks they spent in the Beatty motel.

Turner was arrested nearby and has been charged with kidnapping, sexual assault, false imprisonment and assault and battery and was held on $275,000 bond.

Ex-MMA Star War Machine Sentenced to Life in Beating of Porn Star Girlfriend

By HardBoiledNews Staff

War Machine won’t see the light of day until he is at least 71 years old

LAS VEGAS — The former mixed martial arts star War Machine was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole after 36 years for the brutal beating and sexual assault of his porn star ex-girlfriend in 2014.

The fighter, who legally changed his name from Jonathan Paul Koppenhaver during his MMA career, was convicted in March of the savage beating of former gal pal, Christine Mackinday — whose porn name was Christy Mack — and her friend Corey Thomas after finding them in bed in her Las Vegas home.

Koppenhaver had faced the possibility of life in prison with no chance of parole. Mackinday said it didn’t matter, as she would never feel safe.

“I don’t know how much time in prison would make me feel right,” she told the judge. “But I do know that when he gets out he will kill me.”

Koppenhaver, 35, said he was deeply remorseful for what had happened and his lawyers had asked for a 16-year-to-life sentence.

“Not a day goes by that I don’t seriously regret what I did,” Koppenhaver told the judge. “I hated the way I think. I hated my impulses. … I hate myself.”

Prosecutors said Koppenhaver beat Mackinday, 26, for nearly two hours during the August 2014 attack before she was able to escape and get help. At one point during the attack, Mack testified that Koppenhaver told her, “Now I have to kill you. I’ve gone too far.”

Mackinday had testified that she had endured an abusive relationship with Koppenhaver for 15 months but had called it off at the time of the attack. He savagely beat her in a fit of jealousy after storming into her home and finding her clothed in bed with Thomas, whom she had been dating for two months.

She suffered multiple serious injuries, including a broken nose, lacerated liver, two lost teeth and a fractured rib. She said the emotional damage she suffered may have been worse and that she continues to live in fear.

 

 

Crazed Trucker Rams 18-Wheeler Into Nevada’s Famed Bunny Ranch

By HardBoiledNews Staff

MOUND HOUSE, Nevada — A crazed ex-trucker stole an 18-wheeler and rammed it into the notorious Moonlite Bunny Ranch brothel in Nevada, causing extensive damage to the building’s facade, authorities said.

The brothel, which known after being featured in the HBO series “Cathouse,” was open for business at the time of the early morning crash, but no one was injured.

The suspect, identified as Brian Brandt, 40, of Reno, had allegedly stolen the truck from his former employer, before backing it through the front gate of the ranch around 4 a.m., the Lyon County Sheriff’s office said.

He was charged with assault with a deadly weapon (the truck), destruction of property and  possession of stolen property.

Ranch owner Dennis Hof said Brandt was wearing full body armor when he ran out of the truck following the crash. Hof said the episode appeared to be “an apparent sadistic attempt to gain notoriety,” but that business was unaffected.

“America’s most beloved working girls are shaken by this horrific incident, but they are not deterred from their mission to deliver incomparable sexual pleasure to horny people across the globe,” he said.

Mikki Lynn said she was in with a client when the crash occurred which caused the whole building to shake.

“I was totally on top of this guy, riding and all of sudden it felt like an earthquake and the whole building started shaking and I’m like, ‘Damn, I’m good, but I’m not that good. What’s going on?’ So I throw on a towel and run out and get out here and he put the whole damn truck in the back door. I tried to tell him that was a specialty party and he had to pay extra for that,” she said.

Brian Brandt

The Reno Gazette-Journal reported that Brandt had been arrested a little over a week before the crash and charged with battery and conspiracy to destroy property, an episode that led to his dismissal from the trucking company where he had worked.

 

 

Killer Bee Attack Leaves Dog Dead and Two People Hospitalized

By HardBoiledNews Staff

LAS VEGAS — A swarm of killer bees left a dog dead and sent two people to the hospital after terrorizing residents of a Sin City street, authorities said.

The terrifying episode of Friday afternoon sent people “running down the street” in an effort to getting away from the swarming bees, the Clark County Fire Department said.

Officials said there was no indication that the bees had been provoked before going on the attack.

The dog, named China, was outside at the time of the attack and died despite efforts by its owner to get her inside.

“We just got attacked by bees. Hundreds of them. I don’t know where they came from,” the woman, named Rose, told KLAS-TV.

She said she and her husband were also attacked.

“I’m not sure how many times we were stung, but we were literally covered head to toe,” Rose said.

Two people were hospitalized and third person was treated at the scene by emergency personnel who donned protective gear.

Officials cordoned off the area and urged people nearby to stay indoors and keep their windows shut.

“We’re kind of just waiting until they pick a new spot,” assistant fire chief Larry Haydu told the Las Vegas Review-Journal.

Vegas Cops Catch Man Attacking Decoy in Hunt for Killer of 2 Vagrants

By HardBoiledNews Staff

Shane Schindler used a hammer to beat a mannequin staged to look like a homeless person

LAS VEGAS — A hammer-wielding lunatic was arrested in a Las Vegas police sting after attacking a mannequin staged to look like a sleeping homeless man by investigators trying to solve the recent beating deaths of two homeless men.

Police say they watched as Shane Schindler walked up to the dummy which had been covered with blankets on a sidewalk near where one of the homeless men was bludgeoned to death, pull out a 4-pound hammer out of Little Caesar’s Pizza bag and scan the area.

He then brought the hammer down several times on the dummy’s head, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported. Police captured the beating on surveillance camera.

Schindler, 30, admits he struck the mannequin, but insists he knew it was not a real person all along.

“When close enough to strike his victim, Schindler removed the hammer from the bag then struck what he thought was a human being in the head with the hammer with the intent to kill,” the police report states. “The decoy mannequin was staged in a manner which would have made it impossible for Schindler to have determined the mannequin was not a human being before he struck. Schindler swung the hammer using both arms to generate maximum force to his blow.”

Police had set up the trap near where the two men had been beaten to death earlier this year.

Daniel Aldape, 46, was found dead with his body on the ground wrapped in blankets on Jan. 4 after having been struck “four or five times” on the head with a heavy object, police said. David Dunn, 60, was found dead a month later of head trauma at the same intersection, cops said.

At the time, cops said they had no leads, but hadn’t ruled out the possibility of “thrill kills,” which is why they staged the trap using a mannequin.

Schindler has so far been charged with carrying a concealed weapon, but the judge in the case ordered him held on $50,000 bond — 10 times the usual amount for such a charge.

His lawyer argued the figure was excessive and that Schindler insists he is innocent.

Brothers Brawl Over Packers-Cowboys Game Turns Deadly

By HardBoiledNews Staff

Robert (l) and Justin Boyer’s sibling rivalry came to a head over a heated football game

LAS VEGAS  — This gives a whole new definition to the term “sports nut.”

A fight between a pair of brothers over the Green Bay Packers and Dallas Cowboys game turned deadly when one of them pulled out a knife and fatally stabbed his sibling, police said.

The skirmish broke out after Green Bay scored a stunning victory with a last-second field goal on Sunday and the two brothers, Robert and Justin Dale Boyer, began arguing.

Things got so heated between the men, one of whom is a die-hard Cowboys fan and both of whom had been drinking, that the two had to be separated, cops said.

But moments later, 40-year-old Justin, who was visiting from North Dakota,, ran at his 46-year-old brother, prompting Robert to pull out a knife and stab Justin several times, police said.

Justin Boyer then fled the house and began pounding on neighbors’ doors, prompting a call to police. When cops arrived they found him covered in blood and rushed him to a local hospital where he later died.

Police have not yet arrested Robert Boyer, who was taken to a local hospital to be treated for injuries he suffered in the fight, as they say they believe he was acting in self defense, although the investigation is ongoing.

KSNV-TV reported that Justin Boyer may have suffered from some kind of mental illness, citing police sources.

Man Pleads Guilty in Terrorist Plot to Create Separatist State in India

By HardBoiledNews Staff

Balwinder Singh, aka Happy, had some sinister plans for India

Balwinder Singh, aka Happy, had some sinister plans for India

RENO, Nevada — A man named Happy has pleaded guilty to helping organize an assassination attempt on an Indian official and supporting terrorist attacks aimed at creating an independent Sikh state there.

Federal prosecutors in Nevada say Balwinder Singh — who is also known as Jhaji, Happy, Possi and Baljit Singh — had been in contact with a group of Sikh nationalists in India to arrange sending a supporter from the United States to kill a government official.

Singh, 42, is an Indian citizen and a permanent U.S. resident living in Reno. Prosecutors say that in October 2013, Singh had plotted with the others to send the man to India to carry out the attack and acquired two sets of night vision goggles for him to use. In December of that year, the co-conspirator was arrested trying to board a flight from San Francisco to Bangkok, foiling the plot.

Following the bust, Singh and the others continued to discuss and plan a terror attack in India until Singh’s arrest later that December. He has been in custody since.

“National security is a top priority for the U.S. Attorney’s Office and we will continue to work with our law enforcement partners to locate, identify, and prosecute those who conspire and attempt to provide material support to terrorists and terrorist activities,” said U.S. Attorney Daniel Bogden.

Singh pleaded guilty to conspiring to provide material support and resources to terrorists with the intending of it being used to commit terrorist attacks overseas. He faces up to 15 years in prison when he is sentenced in February.

The cause Singh admitted supporting aims to create a separate Sikh nation called Khalistan — or the land of the pure — in the Indian state of Punjab.