Charges dropped against teen in fatal North Las Vegas shooting
Two weeks ago, a North Las Vegas 16-year-old was handcuffed at his home and jailed, facing a murder charge that could end his own life.
On Tuesday, authorities admitted they made a mistake.
Patrick Wayne Harper was nowhere near the place where Andrea Lafon was shot in the head during a drug deal gone bad. He was 2 miles away, buying a slushy drink on the way to a high school football game.
The Clark County district attorney’s office dropped the charge against Harper on Tuesday, according to North Las Vegas Justice Court.
“It’s a once in a lifetime” occurrence, said Kristina Wildeveld, Harper’s lawyer. She said she has not seen a case like it in 20 years of practicing law.
North Las Vegas police had accused Harper of fatally shooting Lafon, 20, on Sept. 5. He was arrested Sept. 11, and prosecutors intended to try him as an adult.
From the day of his arrest through Sept. 16, he was held in Clark County Juvenile Justice Services Detention Center, Wildeveld said. He then was moved to a juvenile cell at the Clark County Detention Center, where he was housed till he was released Tuesday about 5:45 p.m.
Harper and his family could not be reached for comment.
Surveillance video Wildeveld’s office obtained shows Harper was at a convenience store buying a drink near his school, Mojave High, the night of the shooting. That is about 2 miles from the neighborhood where Lafon was shot in the head about 7:15 p.m. in the 2600 block of Small Mountain Avenue, near the intersection of Ann and Losee roads.
The video lines up with what Harper told investigators when he was taken into custody, according to an arrest report.
He said he had gone to a Mojave football game the night of the shooting.
Statements from multiple students and coaches support the alibi, Wildeveld said. She also said her office contacted people who commented on the Review-Journal’s website saying that Harper was innocent.
An investigator from Wildeveld’s office moved quickly to obtain the surveillance video, which Wildeveld said would have been erased on schedule seven days after the recording was made.
The dropped charges come after a North Las Vegas police arrest report that shows officers had a difficult time identifying Harper as a suspect early in their investigation.
A witness told police he went to school with the shooter, who goes by “Patrick too Livee,” according to a police report.
A witness also provided police with Facebook photos they said showed the shooter, police said.
North Las Vegas police then got in touch with Clark County School District police at Mojave to help identify “Patrick too Livee,” according to a police report. School officers provided North Las Vegas police the name Patrick Wayne Harper and a year-old photo of him.
When North Las Vegas police later showed the photo of Harper to a witness, the arrest report said, the witness couldn’t say who it was. Police also showed a witness a photo of someone else, but that name is redacted in the arrest report.
North Las Vegas police said Tuesday that they are working to “authenticate” the surveillance video and that they are searching for more evidence in the case.
If they find more, Harper could be named as a suspect again, department spokeswoman Chrissie Coon said.
“This may be a situation where the ball’s now back in our court and our detectives have to work twice as hard as they did the first time to try and establish who did it and the evidence we need to be able to prove it in a court of law,” Coon said.
Police aren’t focusing all their efforts on Harper, Coon said, and could be looking at others who may have pulled the trigger.
Wildeveld said Harper, who was in 11th grade, had been expelled from school.
School district spokeswoman Melinda Malone said Harper was enrolled at Mojave on Tuesday.
Lafon and a friend were sitting in a car on Sept. 5, waiting to meet a group of people to sell them marijuana, North Las Vegas police said.
When someone in the group was $5 short of the $40 he needed to purchase less than an ounce of marijuana, he argued with Lafon, police said.
He pulled a gun from his waistband and shot Lafon in the head.
She was taken to University Medical Center, where she died the next day.
Anyone with information on the shooting can contact police at 702-633-9111 or, to remain anonymous, call Crime Stoppers at 702-385-5555 or visit crimestoppersofnv.com.
Review-Journal reporter Annalise Porter contributed to this story. Contact Ricardo Torres at rtorres@reviewjournal.com and 702-383-0381. Find him on Twitter: @rickytwrites. Contact Kimber Laux at klaux@reviewjournal.com or at 702-383-0391. Find her on Twitter: @lauxkimber.
