According to London’s Daily Mail, Thursday’s tragic mass stabbing on the Las Vegas Strip, which killed two and wounded six, could probably have been avoided had a Los Angeles district attorney not bungled an earlier prosecution of the suspect.
Yoni Barrios, an alleged undocumented Guatemalan migrant, was charged with domestic violence in 2019 by L.A. district attorney Jackie Lacey, according to the Daily Mail. A conviction would likely have resorted in his deportation. However, Lacey failed to bring the case to court within 90 days, as required by California’s speedy trial laws. In fact, the first pre-trial hearing was left until more than two years after the initial charges, on April 8, 2021. The judge dismissed the case the same day.
Lacey left office in 2020. But not before also coming under scrutiny for failing to prosecute an LAPD police officer who shot and killed a homeless man in 2015 – despite a recommendation to do so from LAPD chief Charlie Beck.
Suspect Apparently Pled For Help on L.A. News
Footage captured by L.A.’s Telemundo 52 news just two days before the attack captured a man, identifying himself as Yoni Barrios, who asked for help and said he had lost everything he had, KNBC-TV reported yesterday.
“He kept telling me, ‘I just want an opportunity, I just want to start from scratch,’ ” Telemundo 52 videographer Jorge Lopez told KNBC.
The man also showed a prescription he said he got from the Saban Community Clinic in Hollywood, according to KNBC. The man said he believed the prescription was “messing with his brain,” and that someone was trying to kill him.
According to Las Vegas police, Barrios arrived in Las Vegas from California earlier in the week. He then took a bus to the Las Vegas Strip by bus around at 8 a.m. Thursday, telling police that he went there after a friend refused to let him stay at his house.
According to Barrios’ arrest report, he met four women on a pedestrian bridge who were posing as showgirls for a modeling company. He asked them to take a photo with a foot-long kitchen knife he was trying to sell before stabbing one woman in the chest and another in the back. He then ran off and slashed six others.
The Clark County Coroner’s Office identified the two victims who died as Brent Allan Hallett, 47, and Maris Mareen DiGiovanni, 30, both of Las Vegas. Six others were wounded. According to the Daily Mail, DiGiovanni was a former elementary school teacher.
Barrios, 32, appeared in court on Friday afternoon. A judge ordered him to remain in custody without bail until his initial arraignment on Tuesday, Oct. 11.
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