LAS VEGAS (AP) – A Nevada judge was due to hear a former Las Vegas-area elected official’s bid to dismiss his lawyer and represent himself on a murder charge in the killing of Las Vegas Review-Journal reporter Jeff German who wrote articles critical of him and his office.
A former Democratic county official Robert “Rob” Telles, recently told The Associated Press (AP) in a jail interview that he intends to drop the attorney he hired in January and find another lawyer to get his case to trial quicker than the recently postponed November date.
He did not provide new evidence in his defence but said he wants to testify before a jury.
“I don’t want to draw this out,” Telles told the AP.
“I’m looking to make sure I tell the truth and I get exonerated and that I can make it home and continue with my life.” Telles, a 46-year-old attorney and married father of three, won’t face the death penalty in Las Vegas but could face decades in state prison if he’s convicted of open murder. He remains jailed without bail.
Telles has granted several jailhouse interviews with television reporters but he has refused to tell AP during a nearly 40-minute interview what he was doing the day police and prosecutors said German was attacked and killed in a side yard of German’s house.
Police and prosecutors said they have strong evidence that Telles killed German, including Telles’ DNA found beneath German’s fingernails.
Neighbourhood video shows a man wearing an orange work shirt and extra-broad straw hat walking near German’s home and entering German’s yard.
Police said they recovered cut-up pieces of a straw hat and walking shoes at Telles’ home the day he was arrested.
Video images also showed a red Chevrolet Yukon Denali driving in German’s neighbourhood. Telles acknowledged he owns a red Yukon Denali but denied the vehicle seen near German’s home was his. He insisted evidence that police and prosecutors said was collected at his home and on German was “planted.”
In addition to delays due to attorney changes, steps toward trial are on hold pending a ruling by the state Supreme Court on an appeal by the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department of a judge’s order blocking homicide detectives from accessing digital records on computers and a cellphone seized from German’s home.
Police said they need to review the material for possible evidence to complete the investigation in the case against Telles.
German was one of at least 67 news media workers killed worldwide in 2022, the highest number since 2018, according to a report in January by the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists.
Thirty-five of the known killings took place in just three countries: Ukraine, Mexico and Haiti. German was the only one in the United States.
