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To listen ad free, visit sinspod dot co slash subscribe
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starting at two ninety nine a month. You'll also get
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By the end of Ron Mortenson's trial, one former Metro
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officer had been convicted of murdering Daniel Mendoza. But for
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Daniel's family, for his neighborhood, for activists, and the many
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people with eyes on Las Vegas Metro, the verdict did
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not answer everything.
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Even as Mortensen's legal fate seemed sealed, more questions were
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already rising to the surface. Christopher Brady's own conduct, his history,
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and the allegations that followed him would keep raising doubts
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and forcing people to ask, how much did the jury
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never get to hear?
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Hi, and Welcome to Sins and Survivors, a Las Vegas
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true crime podcast where we focus on missing persons, unsolved cases,
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and cases involving domestic violence, which is the number one
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cause of homicide in the Las Vegas area. I'm your
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host Sean.
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And I'm your co host John.
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For the past month, we have been covering the murder
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of Daniel Mendoza, a twenty one year old who was
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shot and killed in front of his home when two
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off duty police officers, Ron Mortenson and Christopher Brady drove
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by his house and one of the officers fired a
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gun at Daniel and his friends. If you have not
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listened to parts one through four yet, we strongly recommend
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going back and starting there, as we are now deep
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into the trial, the verdict, and the aftermath. You can
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visit sinspod dot co Slash one twenty nine to start
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with part one to get caught up. When we left
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off in part four, Ron Mortenson was on trial for
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Daniel's murder, with Christopher Brady acting as a key witness
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for the prosecution. For weeks, the city was holding its breath,
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fearing the worst if Mortenson was found not guilty, expecting
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protests and riots to break out and missed rising concerns
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over over policing and racism. The injustice of Daniel's murder
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was undeniable. An unarmed twenty one year old celebrating the
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holidays with friends was purposely shot down by drunk off
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duty cops who came into his neighborhood solely to harass
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working class people and minorities. Metro, the community, and even
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the trial judge were rumored to be concerned about what
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could happen if Mortenson walked free. Many people believe the
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case came down to credibility. Christopher Brady took the stand
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and testified that Mortenson fired the shots that killed Daniel.
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Mortenson took the stand in his own defense and testified
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that Brady was the real shooter. The jury saw the
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truck Brady drove that night, heard about the ballistic evidence,
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and the competing versions of what happened, and ultimately found
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Mortenson guilty of first degree murder with the use of
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a deadly weapon.
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The day immediately after their verdict was entered, those same
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jurors had to decide whether Mortenson would someday have a
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chance at parole. During the penalty phase, prosecutor William Coot
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asked jurors to think beyond Mortenson himself, told to consider
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the damage Mortenson had done not only to Daniel's family,
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but to the community, to the police department, and to
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the fragile trust between officers and the neighborhoods they're supposed
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to serve. The Review Journal highlighted one of his lines
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in large type in their article about the sentencing, consider
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the residual damage done by Ronald Mortenson. If mister Mortenson
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has to be made an object lesson, then so be it.
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And after less than three hours of deliberation, the jury
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returned with the harshest sentence available, life in prison without
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the possibility of parole. The Review Journal described Daniel's father,
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Ramone Mendoza, his brother Ivan, and his grandmother Maria reacting
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in court. The paper reported that Ramone said the exact
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sentence Mortenson received was of little interest to him because
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no prison term could help his graving family. Whether Mortenson
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could be paroled or would remain imprisoned for the rest
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of his life, Daniel was still gone.
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The front page of the night next morning's paper revealed
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a complicated story that went beyond just one man being
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sentenced for murder. On one side of the page was Mortenson,
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convicted and being led away in handcuffs to spend the
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rest of his life in prison. On the other was
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Christopher Brady, the officer who had driven the truck left
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McKellar's circle, kept control of the murder weapon for nearly
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two days, and testified for the state The article directly
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under Brady's name was not about Daniel Mendoz's murder directly,
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it called Brady's background and credibility into question. The reporting
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echoed the concerns of many people in Daniel's neighborhood and
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among civil rights leaders. The case still had a hole
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in its center. For a lot of people, the Brady
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question had not been resolved at all, and even broader
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than that. Almost immediately after Mortenson's conviction, lawmakers and activists
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were talking about civilian oversight of Metro. One review journal
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headline put it plainly police control. Debated State Senator Joe
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Neil argued that the Morton and case showed someone objective
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should be watching over the police to make sure they
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weed out the bad cops before somebody else gets killed.
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Metro officials pushed back on the idea that a civilian
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review board would necessarily have prevented Daniel's murder, but they
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also said that they were beginning to screen recruits more carefully.
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The public was asking how two officers who admitted they
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were driving around harassing people while off duty had been
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allowed to be cops in the first place.
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That brings us back to Christopher Brady. By the end
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of the trial, the jury had heard Brady's version of
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Daniel's shooting, but it had not heard everything that would
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later surround him. Some of that was because of ordinary
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rules of evidence. A jury is not supposed to hear
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every bad thing a witness has allegedly done, especially if
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the allegation is unproven, unrelated, or likely to distract from
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the facts the jury is supposed to decide on. We've
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talked many times about this on the podcast when we've
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talked about prior bad acts. The fact that but the
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jury did not hear something does not automatically mean that
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something improper happened, But that's always hard to reconcile when
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you're talking about justice. In this case, the gap between
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the way the prosecution presented Brady to the jury as
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the man who had essentially solved the case for Metro
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and the record that emerged around him afterward became a
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major issue for Mortenson's supporters and the community at large.
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From earlier episodes, you'll likely recall that even though Brady
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was the witness for the state, his hands were not clean.
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Given what he testified to under oath. He admitted to
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drunk driving that he and Mortensen went into lower income
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neighborhoods looking to harass people. He called those people that
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he targeted dopers, bangers, and screwball people. He described driving recklessly, accelerating,
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doing one to eighties, cutting through alleys, and generally messing around.
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He told the jury that they thought they could get
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away with harassing people in those neighborhoods because they were
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nasty people. His testimony seemed to indicate that this wasn't
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a one time drunken but something he and other officers
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did often. Brady admitted to driving away from the scene
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when it was unknown if anyone was hurt, that he
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handled and cleaned the weapon used in the shooting, and
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that he waited two days to go to his supervisor
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to report what had happened. From the state's point of view,
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they needed him because he was the only person who
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could testify about what happened inside the truck and back
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up their theory of the case. But every time Brady
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explained why he and Mortensen were there, he reminded the
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jury that he was not just an innocent bystander. Later
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testimonies showed that detectives initially wanted to do what was
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called a walk through booking of Brady for a possible
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accessory charge, and that never happened. Command staff decided the
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matter should go to the district attorney because Brady had
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come in voluntarily and because by then he was being
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treated as essentially a witness for the state. That one
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decision shaped everything that followed, and the decision of whether
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Brady should have been treated as a suspect an accessory
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or something more serious never really went away.
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We're going to pause here for a quick break, but
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when we come back, we're going to dive into the
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incidence from Brady's past that the jury never got to hear.
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The first category of information the jury did not fully
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hear involved Brady's internal affairs history with Metro. After the trial,
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the Review Journal published an article under the headline Brady
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no stranger to complaints. According to that reporting, police internal
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affairs complaints against Brady showed he had been accused of
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roughing up one Latino man, inappropriately pointing a gun at another,
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and unnecessarily handcuffing several other people. The article said most
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of the eight complaints against Brady, which had been filed
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over a three month period in nineteen ninety five involved
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neglective duty, failure to fallow policy, and general rudeness to
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members of the public. Only three of the eight complaints
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were substantiated by the investigators. We will note that a
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complaint is not the same thing as a sustained finding,
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but the overall picture was still troubling, especially because Brady
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was early in his career when this all happened. One
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of the complaints involved an incident at the Startus's hotel,
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where a witness said Brady and another officer were removing
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an unruly man from the property. According to the internal
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affairs information quoted by the newspaper, the witness said one
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officer threw the man toward a patrol car, where he
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hit his head and then fell to the ground. The
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report noted that no one noticed injuries when the man
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was booked, and he could not later be found for questioning,
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so the excessive force complaint could not be upheld. In
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other complaints, cab driver's alleged Brady was overbearing and rude
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while removing and handcuffing them after minor traffic violations. In
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one of those incidents, the citations included reckless driving and
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excessive use of a horn. In another complaint, a motorist
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named Lewis Nongali said Brady unjustifiably pointed a loaded gun
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at him. Brady was cited for violating policy and not
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using sound judgment, and for failing to complete reports on
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the incident.
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The paper also reported on a complaint involving motorists named
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Jorge Escobar, who said an officer pointed a gun at
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his head for no reason. Authorities concluded Escobar was referring
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to Brady, but following an investigation, the complaint remained unsubstantiated. Again,
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we note that it's important to consider that some complaints
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were sustained while some were not, and some were later
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described by Metro officials as the kinds of complaints that
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were related to professionalism, but not necessarily the kinds of
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complaints that usually lead to termination. Under Sheriff Richard Wingnett
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said that the Department safeguards had alerted administrators to a
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large number of complaints against Brady early in his career,
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and that disciplinary action had followed, including written reprimands and
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increased training. But for anyone looking at Brady's credibility after
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Daniel's murder, the real issue was whether the jury had
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been allowed to see the broader pattern that was central
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to Mortensen's defense arguments. Defense attorney Frank Kremin had tried
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to present some of Brady's internal affairs history to the jury.
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Judge Joseph Pavlikowski did not allow it. As we mentioned earlier,
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that kind of ruling is not unusual, though judge's routinely
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limit evidence if they believe it's unrelated, prejudicial, or not
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sufficiently connected to the facts of the case, or if
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they will likely distract the jury. Brady's complaints, at least
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as Metro framed them, involved rudeness, poor judgment, and internal
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policy violations, none of which were necessarily evidence that he
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had killed Daniel Mendoza or that he was lying. However,
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to Mortensen and his defense team, the complaints mattered because
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Brady's credibility was the case. The state was asking jurors
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to believe Brady when he said that he had only
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drawn his gun when he thought Mortensen saw a threat,
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and that he had not fired his gun. The defense
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wanted to show that Brady had a history of aggressive
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or improper policing, and that this history made his version
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of the night much harder to accept.
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Then there were allegations involving Brady and Mortensen's history working
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together as partners. We touched on some of this earlier
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in the series, but we want to revisit these incidents
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so that our listeners have the complete picture of Christopher
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Brady that the jury did not necessarily get. Brady and
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Mortensen had worked together for about six months before Daniel
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was killed, and during that period there were already complaints
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about the way they treated people in the neighborhoods they patrolled.
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One incident involved an eighteen year old named Raoul Luis Mouskada.
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According to later reporting and court records we reviewed, Mosquada
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was arrested for possession of a pair of scissors and
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being under the influence of a controlled substance. He ended
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up in the hospital because of injuries he sustained during
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the arrest, and the hospital staff were directed to restrain
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him and pump his stomach because the officers suspected an overdose.
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Nothing was found in his system, and the district attorney
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later dropped the charges for lack of evidence. Another incident
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involved Sergio Acosta. According to a cost later lawsuit, in
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early December nineteen eighty six, Just a few weeks before
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David Mendoza was killed, Brady and Mortenson were involved in
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a stop where Brady allegedly kicked and choked Acosta while
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Mortenson allegedly held a gun to the head of Acosta's friend.
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Acosta was arrested on a charge of being under the
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influence of cocaine and forced to submit to a urine test,
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which came back negative. Despite that negative test, Acosta said
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he was held in a North Las Vegas jail until
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December seventeenth. He said he lost his job at Bally's
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because of the charges he faced. Those allegations were not
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the same as proof in Daniel's murder case, but they
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raised a disturbing question. If Brady and Mortensen were already
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drawing complaint about aggressive conduct, why were they still working
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together and why did no one intervene before mckeller circle.
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There was also the alleged culture behind some of these encounters.
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In earlier episodes, we talked about the term fishing, which
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surfaced in connection with the civil litigation around the case.
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According to later test, the term referred to off duty
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police officers getting drunk driving into minority neighborhoods and finding
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people they viewed as gang members or criminals, and provoking
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confrontations for fun. Former Sergeant Ron Fox described it as
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barroom talk that he said he had often heard rumors about.
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The federal lawsuit alleged that senior officials within Metro knew
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this kind of behavior was happening, and they looked the
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other way. Allegations about a culture are not the same
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thing as proof about any one officer on any one night. However,
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Brady himself admitted to this conduct of fishing in Daniel's case.
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He admitted that he and Mortensen were drunk, they were
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off duty, they were driving around, They were harassing people
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in neighborhoods where they thought they could get away with it. So,
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even if the jury did not hear every complaint, every allegation,
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or every civil rights claim, the pattern was becoming visible.
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Brady was not just a reluctant witness who happened to
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do the right thing by coming forward. He was an
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officer who admitted that he had participated in the harassment
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that led to Daniel's death. He had his own internal
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affairs history, and his partnership with Mortenson had already generated
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serious complaints he was an officer whose role in the
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homicide investigation had been treated very differently from Mortenson's. That
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doesn't prove that Brady fired the gun. It does not
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undo the eyewitness testimony or erase the ballistics evidence, but
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it does explain why so many people kept asking whether
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the state star witness had been examined with the same
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skepticism that any ordinary suspect would have faced.
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The day after Mortenson was sentenced to life without parole,
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the Review Journal ran another story about Brady. The headline
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said Mortenson had been present at a Brady traffic stop
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and that police might be asked to reopen a sexual
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assault probe involving Brady. The allegation came from Carrie Morris,
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a twenty six year old Las Vegas woman, who said
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Brady had coerced her into a sexual act during a
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traffic stop. According to the reporting, Morris said she'd been
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stopped on Wind Road in October of nineteen ninety six,
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about two months before Daniel Mendoza was killed. She said
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Brady called mortensonto the scene, searched her car, and then
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told her she had an outstanding traffic warrant and would
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be taken to jail. Morris alleged that while she was
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being taken to jail, Brady stopped in a vacant alley
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and forced her to perform a sex act. She also
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alleged that Brady threatened to plant drugs on her if
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she reported what had happened. Brady denied the allegations. His
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attorneys said the claims were false, publicity driven, and motivated
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by resentment toward law enforcement. Police had previously investigated Morris's
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complaint and said they did not have enough evidence to
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support criminal charges. After the Mortenson verdict, Morris and her attorney,
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Andrew Meyers asked Clark County District Attorney Stuart Bell to
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take another look. Bell said that since they had a
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victim who wanted to proceed, prosecutors would meet with Metro
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and decide what they could prove and what they could
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not prove. Metro said it would honor the request us
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to reopen communications about the issue. So in the days
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immediately after Mortenson was convicted and sentenced, the public was
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seeing a new version of Christopher Brady, not only as
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the witness who helps convict Mortenson, but as the former
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officer at the center of another serious allegation. I want
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to note that Morris's allegation did not result in a
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criminal conviction. The district attorney ultimately declined to prosecute Brady,
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saying that there was not enough evidence to successfully pursue charges.
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In a later decision, Bell reportedly concluded that something improper
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may have happened, but that the evidence was not strong
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enough to prove a criminal case beyond a reasonable doubt.
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That is a narrow legal conclusion.
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This allegation continued to matter for two important reasons. One
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the more obvious one is because that it went directly
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to the question of Brady's credibility, his use of authority,
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and what the jury in the Mortenson trial didn't hear.
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But even more important was what Morris told authority that
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Brady had said during the incident. As a reminder, during
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the trial on Daniel's murder, Mortenson testified that after the shooting,
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when he asked Brady why he had fired the gun,
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Brady told him I told you I was evil, man,
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I'm evil. According to later reporting, Morris said that when
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she asked Brady why he had assaulted her, he said,
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some people call me evil, and then laughing said something
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like sometimes I call myself evil man, I am evil.
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Her attorney also said that a therapist who counseled Morris
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was willing to testify that Morris had described Brady using
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that language before Mortenson took the stand, which would show
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that Carrie wasn't making up that part after she knew
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about Mortenson's testimony about what Brady said after the murder.
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That phrase I am evil became one of the key
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pieces of Mortenson's post trial motions. His defense attorney later
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argued that if jurors had known that another person had
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independently described Brady using that same evil language, it could
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have affected how they evaluated Mortenson's testimony. The state argued
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that Morris's allegation had serious credibility problems, that the evil
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statement did not prove who fired the gon on mckeller circle,
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and that the evidence was not enough to justify a
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new trial. The court agreed with the state, and Mortenson
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was not granted a new trial. But from the perspective
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of the people who never accept the clean version of
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Brady's role, the statement was hard to ignore and much
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more than a coincidence. That line, which was one of
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the most theatrical parts of Mortenson's testimony feels much more
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likely to have been something that Brady actually said.
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The sexual assault allegation also created another layer of problems
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for Metro. Morris's attorney, Andrew Myers, was openly skeptical that
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Las Vegas police could investigate one of their own. In
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one article, he said that he did not feel that
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Metro could investigate itself properly and describe the situation as
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oppression under the color of law. Soon after the case
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began to move beyond metro internal affairs and LA prosecution,
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the FBI opened a civil rights inquiry into Christopher Brady,
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and on November seventh, nineteen ninety seven, a federal grand
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jury convened to look into his role during the shooting
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on McKellar Circle and the larger pattern of his alleged behavior.
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It's clear that his conduct that night was much larger
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than just a question for Metro's internal processes. We are
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going to pause here for our last break, but when
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we come back, we're going to talk about one final
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Brady accusation that would continue to haunt the case for decades.
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The final issue regarding Brady that we wanted to share
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is the one most directly connected to the night Daniel
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was killed. During Mortenson's trial, you might recall that his attorney,
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Frank Kremen, said that he received an anonymous call claiming
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that Brady had previously talked to another Metro officer, Mark Barry,
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about wanting to do a drive by shooting. At the time,
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a prosecutor told the court that an investigator had spoken
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with Barry and that the claim was nonsense, so the
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jury never heard from him. But a year later, in
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night Time teen ninety eight, Barry testified before the federal
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grand jury, and his account was not as the state
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had called it nonsense. Mark Barry said that Brady had
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mentioned doing a drive by several times. He said he
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had not taken the comments seriously at the time because
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they had been drinking and blowing off steam and because
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the comment sounded like a joke. Barry also said that
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when the shooting on McKellar's Circle happened, those comments came
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back to him. He testified that after hearing about Daniel's death,
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he started thinking that maybe Brady had been serious. He
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used the phrase that he put two and two together
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when asked how many times Brady had talked about drybys.
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Barry could not give an exact number, but he agreed
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that a few times would be fair, and at one
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point half a dozen was suggested as a safe estimate.
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This was critical because it was not simply another allegation
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that Brady had been rude, aggressive, or careless. Brady had
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testified that the harassment on December twenty seventh was basically
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a spontaneous idea, something that just dawned on him that night.
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But Barry's later testimony, if credible, suggested Brady had talked
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about drive by violence before on several occasions. If believed,
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Barry's account went directly to the theory that Brady had
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talked before Daniel's murder about the very kind of violence
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that occurred on mckeller Circle, and certainly a jury may
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have doubted his story if they had heard that from Barry.
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Shockingly, despite what was presented at the murder trial, Barry
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testified to the federal grand jury that homicide detectives never
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came to talk to him. He said two people contacted
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him by phone during the trial, but he didn't know
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who they were, and because it involved a murder case,
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he wasn't willing to explain everything over the phone to strangers.
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He expected to be subpoenaed, and he said that he
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was prepared to say what he knew, but no subpoena came.
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The state's position then and later was that Barry's testimony
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did not prove Brady was the shooter and would not
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have changed the result of the trial. On October ninth,
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nineteen ninety eight, the state District Court held an evidentiary
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hearing on Mortenson's motion for a new trial, but determined
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that Barry's statements were insufficient to justify that request. Unsurprisingly,
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the Bary issue did not disappear. It became one of
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the key pieces of evidence Mortensen would keep returning to
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in his appeals decades later. We're going to get into
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those details in a later episode.
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It's no wonder that by the end of nineteen ninety seven,
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the public debate over whether Metro could be trusted to
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police itself was reaching a fever pitch in Las Vegas,
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as the deeper inquiry into Brady's actions, alleged abuses of
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power and whether he had violated the rights of the
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people he was sworn to protect, grew. On August twentieth,
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nineteen ninety nine, Christopher Brady pleaded guilty to vitolating the
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civil rights of Hispanic people. According to the reporting and
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case materials, he took the plea to avoid what was
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described as an inevitable indictment and the possibility of a
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life sentence. He was sentenced to nine years in federal prison,
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and in early two thousand, he surrendered at a federal
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prison in Minnesota. For Daniel's father, Ramon Mendoza, Brady's federal
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case brought something that sounded like acceptance. Ramon told the
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federal court during the sentencing, I don't know why there
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are so many people with such bad feelings. The decision
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that you make, I will respect. I have no anger
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against the person who did what he did to my son,
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because I leave it all in God's hands. And then
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he said something even simpler and maybe even sadder to
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the press. To a certain point, I think it's justice,
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but either way, my son isn't here any more. Brady's father,
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Mike Brady, saw it very differently. He told reporters, Chris
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essentially solved the case for them, and it's been downhill
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for him since then. In Mike Brady's view, his son
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had come forward, turned in the gun, and helped prosecutors
440
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prove the case against Mortensen. However, for people who had
441
00:24:50.799 --> 00:24:54.079
questioned Brady's treatment by Metro from the beginning, that version
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of the story skipped over the part that had always
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bothered them. Brady was never just an outside witness. At
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Brady's federal sentencing hearing, Mortenson's father, Larry and Mortenson's then wife, Zoe,
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were also present. Larry told the press that Brady's plea
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meant that Ron should get a new trial, and he
447
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said he would keep trying to prove that Brady, not
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his son, had killed Daniel. That argument would become the
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center of the next chapter. Mortenson's appeals, his motion for
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a new trial, and his attempts to use the evidence
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of Brady's misconduct would continue for years.
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In July of nineteen ninety nine, Mortenson wrote to Review
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Journal columnist John L. Smith defending his innocence. In that letter,
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he claimed, among other things, that one of Daniel's own
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friends or fellow gang members had actually shot him, and
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that Brady and Mortensen had taken the fall. Smith's response
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was cutting, He wrote, it turns out that Mortenson is innocent.
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And Mendoza's own friends shot him and let the off
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duty cops take the fall. Something told me the letter
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would end that way.
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Brady's guilty plea did not answer every question about mc
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keeller circle, and it did not undo the damage done
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to Daniel Mendoza's family, but it did make one thing
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harder to ignore. We wanted to cover this case because
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it was never only about one night, one truck, or
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one officer who fired a gun. When the people sworn
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to protect a community become the source of harm, the
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question cannot only be who pulled the trigger. This is
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a story about a department, a culture, and the reality
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that Las Vegas was forced to face. As Roman Mendoza
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continued to carry the grief of losing his son, Activists, lawmakers,
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and residents asked what, if anything, Las Vegas was willing
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to change. Next week, we look at Ramone, the push
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for a citizen's review board, and the state of the
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city after Mortenson and Brady, and the larger question that
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Daniel's death left behind. When police power is abused, who
477
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has the authority to hold that power accountable. These questions
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are still relevant nearly thirty years later, because what happens here,
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happens everywhere.
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Thanks for listening. Visit sinspod dot com, slash subscribe for
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You can contact us at questions at sinsnsurvivors dot com.
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If you are someone you know as affected by domestic
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violence or needs support, please reach out to local resources
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or the National Domestic Violence Hotline. A list of resources
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is available on our website, Sins and Survivors dot com.
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Sins and Survivors, a Las Vegas true crime podcast, is research,
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written and produced by your hosts Sean and John. The
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information shared in this podcast is accurate at the time
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of recording. If you have questions, concerns, or corrections, please
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email us. Links to source material for this episode can
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be found on our website, Sends and Survivors dot com.
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The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are solely
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those of the podcast creators, hosts, and their guests. All
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individuals are innocent until proven guilty. This content does not
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constitute legal advice. Listeners are encouraged to consult with legal
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professionals for guidance.
