LAS VEGAS (KLAS) — Deobra Redden could not – and did not – form the intent required to kill a district court judge when he vaulted over the bench, knocking her down and pulling the hair out of her 62-year-old head, a defense attorney said during opening statements at Redden’s trial Wednesday.
“That’s going to be the big question that you guys are going to have to deal with at closing,” Redden’s attorney, Carl Arnold told the jury of 14 people. “Did he have the intent to go ahead and kill?”
Arnold said the jump – made famous worldwide by viral video first disseminated by the 8 News Now Investigators – lasted 3.7 seconds, which is not enough time to form the intent to kill district court judge Mary Kay Holthus. He also said Redden was not on the medication prescribed to him during several months in a mental institution leading up to the January hearing before Holthus.
“No one asked Mr. Redden, ‘Did you take your medication today?'” Arnold said.
But chief deputy district attorney Elizabeth Mercer, in her opening statement to the jury, said that Redden – a three-time felon – had no intention of going back to prison, which is exactly where Holthus was going to send him.
“She was terrified,” Mercer told the jury. “She knew she was no match for his physical strength. So, she hid. She hid as far away from Mr. Redden as she possibly could.”
Redden is currently serving 19 months to four years on an attempted battery charge. He pleaded guilty to swinging a metal baseball bat at an in-law, Arnold said in court.
Mercer also read aloud certain statements Redden made to police after he was taken into custody.
“‘I tried to kill a judge today,'” Mercer said. “Those were the defendant’s words mere hours after he violently attacked Judge Mary Kay Holthus.”
Holthus is expected to testify at trial on Thursday. It will be her first public comment. The only other time she’s officially spoken about the incident is in a grand jury transcript in February.
