Suspect in Vegas crash ‘distraught,’ attorneys say

Casino and street surveillance video cited by the prosecutor has not been made public, and Wolfson said prosecutors don’t plan to present it in court Wednesday, when Holloway is expected to make her first appearance before a judge.

Her next appearance is scheduled for January 20.

Holloway is accused of killing Buckeye, Ariz. resident Jessica Valenzuela and injuring more than 30 pedestrians when she drove up onto the Las Vegas Boulevard sidewalk near the Paris Hotel. She told police she was trying to sleep in her auto at casinos, but was “run off by security” at various properties.

A woman accused of intentionally plowing a auto carrying her young daughter through crowds of pedestrians on the Las Vegas Strip was charged Tuesday with murder, child abuse and hit-and-run. Police in Nevada have confirmed that Holloway had recently changed her name to Paris Paradise Morten, which may serve as either an indicator to her mental stability or an indicator that she was planning to kill pedestrians outside the Paris Las Vegas hotel where her crimes actually took place.

Documents filed Tuesday list the charges against 24-year-old Lakeisha Nicole Holloway, who is due in court Wednesday.

Holloway, who is jailed on a suicide watch, agreed to the delay. The Clark County Coroner’s Office reported today that she died of multiple blunt-force injuries.

The deputy public defender, who represented another driver in a similar crash on the Strip in September 2005, said the defense team needs to see police reports, witness accounts and video before deciding on Holloway’s defense. She was not asked to enter a plea but nodded to acknowledge that she would remain in jail through the holidays while both sides investigate Sunday’s crash that killed an Arizona woman and injured dozens of others.

Additional charges are likely, depending on the results of drug and alcohol tests and police findings, Wolfson said.

Lakeisha Nicole Holloway, believed to be from the OR area, has been charged in a criminal complaint with murder with the use of a deadly weapon in connection to Sunday’s crash, which killed a 32-year-old mother of three and sent over 30 people to the hospital.

Defence lawyer Joseph Abood later characterized Holloway as “distraught” and overwhelmed.

“We have heard nothing however good issues about her in the previous”, Abood stated.

“The video [of the incident] obviously shows intention”, the sheriff said.

Authorities declined to comment on a potential motive and said they were struggling to piece together Holloway’s background.

Holloway was from Portland, Oregon, and had been in Las Vegas for about a week, authorities said. “She loved her family, she loved her daughter, she loved God, this was just traumatic for everybody”.

Several years ago, she graduated from an alternative high school in Portland and received an award for overcoming adversity from the nonprofit Portland Opportunities Industrialization Center, which helps at-risk youths with education and job training. The child’s father, lawyers say, has not come forward.