Man pleads guilty to murder in 2-year-old Las Vegas boy’s death
A 30-year-old man pleaded guilty Thursday to murder and assaulting a police officer, admitting he killed his girlfriend’s 2-year-old son in 2021 and later grabbed a detective’s gun.
Terrell Rhodes initially told police that 2-year-old Amari Nicholson had been kidnapped, prompting a weeklong community-wide search for the boy before his body was found in a nearby apartment complex.
Amari had vanished on May 5, 2021, from an Emerald Suites apartment complex, where he lived with Rhodes and his mother, Taylor Nicholson.
A grand jury indicted Rhodes in May 2021 on charges of murder, two counts of attempted murder, four counts of assaulting a police officer with a deadly weapon and four counts of resisting a police officer with a deadly weapon.
Rhodes pleaded guilty on Thursday to first-degree murder and assault against a protected person with a deadly weapon. Attorneys negotiated a deal that requires Rhodes to serve a sentence of 20 years to life in prison for the murder charge.
“I do intend to go along with the negotiations,” District Judge Jacqueline Bluth said Thursday.
According to a police report, Rhodes confessed to hitting Amari several times after the boy wet himself.
