Sins & Survivors: A Las Vegas True Crime Podcast - The Murder of Daniel Mendoza - Part 4

Episode Date: June 30, 2026

As the murder trial of Daniel Mendoza heated up, Metro Officers Ron Mortenson and Christopher Brady had fully turned on each other. The defense argued that it wasn't their client who pulled the trigger, but the state's key witness.Meanwhile, the trial was taking place in the shadow of the LA Riots, a fact that was definitely on the minds of the district attorney. If the trial didn't provide accountability, would the same thing happen in Las Vegas? Listen now wherever you get your podcasts!https://sinspod.co/132https://sinspod.co/129resourceshttps://sinspod.co/132transcripthttps://sinspod.co/132bloghttps://sinspod.co/132subBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/sins-survivors-a-las-vegas-true-crime-podcast--6173686/support.Domestic Violence Resourceshttp://sinspod.co/resourcesClick here to become a member of our Patreon!https://sinspod.co/patreonVisit and join our Patreon now and access our ad-free episodes and exclusive bonus content & schwag! Get ad-free access for only $1 a month or ad-free and bonus episodes for $3 a monthApple Podcast Subscriptionshttps://sinspod.co/appleWe're now offering premium membership benefits on Apple Podcast Subscriptions! On your mobile deviceLet us know what you think about the episodehttps://www.buzzsprout.com/twilio/text_messages/2248640/open_sms

To listen ad-free, visit sinspod.co slash subscribe. Starting at $2.99 a month, you'll also get access to our exclusive bonus content episodes when you join through Patreon or Apple subscriptions. Thanks for supporting the show. What the state offered the jury in the first part of Ron Mortensen's trial was difficult to ignore. The gun that killed Daniel Mendoza was registered to Mortensen. All the bullets found at the scene came from that gun. No shell casings were found inside the truck's cab, and five witnesses had described the shooter as the passenger in Brady's truck, a man wearing glasses.

But they had not yet heard from the two officers at the center of the case. One would testify for the state. One would testify in his own defense, each asking the jury to believe that the other man killed Daniel Mendoza. And by the end, Las Vegas would be waiting for a verdict that carried far more weight than one man's fate. Hi, and welcome to sins and survivors, a Las Vegas true crime podcast, where we focus on missing person, unsolved cases, and on cases involving the number one cause of homicide in the Las Vegas area, domestic violence. I'm your host, Sean. And I'm your co-host, John. Welcome to part four of our series on the murder of Daniel Mendoza. If you haven't yet had a chance to listen to the first three

episodes in this series, we strongly recommend you start with part one at sinspod.co slash 129, so you can hear the full story. Part two is at sinspod.com slash 130, and part three is at Sinspa.co.co. 131. Last week, we covered the beginning of Ron Mortensen's trial. The state built its case through five eyewitnesses who described the gun coming from the passenger side window of Brady's truck, the forensic evidence tying the bullets to Mortensen's Sig Sauer, and the evidence that the truck was moving as the bullets were fired. We discussed the controversy over Christopher Brady, the officer who drove the truck,

but had not been charged. Local Las Vegas activist groups were calling Daniel Daniel's murder a hate crime and were demanding justice. We also shared one of the most moving parts of the story when Daniel's father, Ramon Mendoza and his grandmother Maria, invited officers over to their home to celebrate Ramon's birthday. The family was in pain. It was just two days before the start of the trial, yet they were working to build community and healing in their neighborhood.

We ended part three at one of the most pivotal parts of the entire trial, the testimony of Christopher Brady. From the start of the investigation, Metro had viewed Brady as the key witness and positioned him as the one who came forward to help solve the murder case. When Christopher Brady took the stand on Monday, May 5, 1997, he was no longer a Metro officer. He had resigned from the department in January due to intense public scrutiny surrounding the case. Courtroom observers and reporters described the intense security that surrounded Brady. He was impossible to catch for a statement or an interview before or after he testified.

One reporter wrote that he seemed to just magically appear in the courtroom after successfully alluding the hordes of photographers that had assembled to capture a photo of one of the city's most infamous witnesses. Brady's sworn testimony covered a lot of what we shared in part two of the series. We also want to remind everyone that Brady was never charged with anything, and it was consistently reported that there was no deal cut between Metro, the DA's office, and Brady. Under oath, Brady fully admitted that he and Mortensen had spent the night of Daniel's murder, drinking heavily to celebrate Mortensen's 31st birthday. They left the party and took a detour to a second bar, driving recklessly through poor neighborhoods in Brady's custom blue 1974 Dodge pickup truck.

Brady told the jury they were seeking to harass people they didn't like because they thought that they were nasty. This is where the description you heard us use of the bangers, the dopers, and the screwball people comes from, directly from Brady's mouth. He told the jury the two of them frequently encountered these kinds of people while working shifts on the force. According to Brady, they routinely harassed citizens while off duty. They thought they could easily get away with it in the late night hours simply because they were cops. He admitted that night that the two of them were acting like, quote, Jerks. Brady admitted that the two of them were legally drunk and that he was the one behind the wheel making the decisions about where the two of them were driving. But he was very clear that when

they approached McKellar's circle, it was Mortensen who directed him to approach the apartments. According to Brady, once they were near the group outside Daniel's apartment, he saw a young man making a slicing motion across his neck, which he interpreted to mean either get out of here or, I have no drugs. He swore under oath that he saw Mortensen stick the Sig Sower pistol fully out the passenger window, which prompted him to react. Brady explained that he too pulled his gun because he believed his partner could be in some kind of danger. He said he had his revolver pointed out the window with the gun across from Mortensen's chest about six inches away from Mortensen's head, fully inside the truck, but aimed outside. Again, he emphasized that the truck's bench seat,

prevented him from reaching all the way out the window. He testified that once he realized there was no threat, he dropped the gun, and he was looking straight ahead when he heard a shot, and then at least four more shots, as he drove away. From the state's perspective, this testimony summarized all prior testimony and evidence presented so far. It put the gun that killed Daniel in Mortensen's hand and explained why Brady had drawn his own gun without making him the shooter. But from the defense's perspective, Brady's testimony gave them multiple opportunities to poke holes in his story. One clear inconsistency the defense locked in on was the way Brady described one of the most important physical details in the case. Brady had previously told police and the grand jury

that he stuck his gun out the window. But at trial, he clarified that he did not mean his arm or his weapon actually went outside the passenger window. It was just pointed in that direction. As we've mentioned earlier, Brady backed up his story. by focusing heavily on the custom bench seat of his truck, which featured a large center console. He testified that the console was flipped down in the arm rest position that night. Because it was down, Brady claimed it was simply impossible for him to stretch his torso entirely across a passenger to fire six shots outside the window frame while keeping his foot on the gas. However, none of the other eyewitnesses testified to seeing a second gun.

The defense posed the question that if Brady was also pointing his gun at the crowd, why had no one else seen that? So the defense was arguing two things. Number one, Brady was changing his story to make Mortensen more culpable, or maybe because he just realized things weren't lining up. But also, two, maybe the witnesses didn't see everything as well as they thought they did. The defense was relentless in its cross-examination of Brady. Mortensen's attorney, Frank Crimin, brought up what he viewed as a highly suspicious detail

about the exact route Brady chose to drive Mortensen home from the PTs in Spring Valley. Instead of getting directly onto the I-15 south at Flamingo and taking it to Blue Diamond Road, which would only be a 15-minute drive to Mortensen's house, Brady took a long detour. He drove down Twain Avenue toward eastern, a route that went through roughly 30 stoplights and took nearly 25 minutes. Kremlin pointed out that this specific route directly intersected with Palo Verde Street, a road that led straight back to the crime scene on McKellar Circle. Kremlin said,

You thought maybe something had gone wrong and you wanted to look to see if there were police wagons there. Brady flatly denied that accusation, claiming that he chose the lengthy route home entirely arbitrarily. We covered the truck evidence in Part 3, so we won't rehash all of that here, but in front of the jury, Kremlin also used those changes to attack Brady's credibility.

Brady admitted that after the shooting, the truck had been changed. The custom seat was removed and sold, it was repainted, and the window tint was taken off. Brady said he made those changes because he was afraid that the truck would be recognizable to the friends of Daniel Mendoza or members of the 18th Street gang and that he feared retaliation. The defense used those changes to posit to the jury that they were actually an attempt to alter or destroy evidence. The defense wanted to question him about prior internal affairs complaints, including allegations involving his conduct in earlier encounters, including claims that he had pulled a gun on a motorist and that there were complaints about aggressive or improper policing. Judge Pavikowski limited what the defense could bring in. The jury did not get the full picture of every allegation and concern that would later surround Christopher Brady.

We're going to pause here for a short break, but when we come back, we're switching gears to talk about the pivotal moment when Ron Mortensen took the stand in his own defense. Mortensen and his attorneys took a major risk in order to have Mortensen tell the jury, in his own words, what he claimed had happened that night. Mortensen did not deny being drunk or that his gun was the weapon that fired the fatal shots. Instead, he told the jury that Brady had taken his gun and used it. According to Mortensen, the night began to shift before they ever reached McKellar Circle. He testified that he felt sick from drinking and wanted to go home. He said he told Brady he was. not feeling well and he wanted to call it a night. But according to Mortensen, Brady did not want the night to end. Mortensen said Brady told him they weren't going home yet and that they were going out to another bar, but first he wanted to trip something out. Mortensen testified that Brady drove erratically, cutting through neighborhoods, speeding through alleys, and looking between the buildings

until they arrived at McKellar Circle and saw Daniel and his friends. Mortensen's version was that he immediately understood this was stupid and wanted it to stop. He testified that he told Brady, come on, Chris, let's go. This is stupid. And then according to Mortensen, Brady said, look out. Mortensen claimed Brady came across the seat, elbowed him in the chest, and put his arm out of the passenger window, and fired. In Mortensen's version, Brady fired one shot, laughed, fired more shots, and said, you better run. Mortensen claimed he tried to stop him, but Brady told him to let go. then Brady slid back fully into the driver's seat and drove away. He said he asked Brady why he had shot at the group and according to Mortensen, Brady said,

The son of a bitch had a gun and you just sat there. Mortensen told Brady he had not seen a gun. According to Mortensen, Brady then said he had shot into the air and he was just trying to scare them. Mortensen claimed that's when he realized that Brady had his sig sour between his legs. When he asked why Brady had used his gun, Mortensen said, Brady told him he couldn't get to his own gun. Morton testified that when he asked Brady why he had done it, Brady told him, I told you I was an evil man. I am evil.

The jury had to decide whether they believed Brady would say something like that or whether Mortensen had invented the line to make Brady sound monstrous. Later, another person would say Brady used very similar language in a very different context. We're holding off getting into the details of all of that for now. There was one more loose thread that surfaced during the trial, though at the time the jury never heard the details. Kremlin told the court that he had received an anonymous call claiming that Brady had previously talked to another metro officer, Mark Barry, about wanting to do a drive-by shooting. The state responded that an investigator has spoken to Barry and that Barry had dismissed that claim as nonsense. That kind of testimony feels pretty material to the matter at hand, but that was the judge's ruling.

But like so many of the unresolved questions around Christopher Brady, that allegation would not stay under wraps forever. Years later, that allegation would come back in a much more serious way. Mortensen testified that after the shooting, Brady tried to make what had happened just sound like something small, something that would be simply written off as a 434 call, which was the Metro Police Code for an illegal discharge of a firearm. According to Mortensen, Brady told him not to worry about it, told him to act natural, and then, once they arrived at the bar, Mortensen said he was scared, sick, and visibly shaken by what he claimed he had just witnessed. The state had a very different view of that testimony. To prosecutors, Mortensen was not a frightened bystander trapped in Brady's

truck. He was a defendant trying to save himself, and his version required the jury to believe something the state argued was physically unlikely, that Brady, a smaller man, could lean across the cab, across Mortensen's body, fire out the passenger window while driving, and somehow do all of this in a way that made the people outside the truck believe that it was the passenger who was the shooter. Prosecutors also tried to attack Mortensen's credibility in other ways. William Coot wanted the jury to hear about an earlier incident involving Mortensen's employment at Dillard's, where he had allegedly been suspected of theft and accused of lying on an application.

The defense objected, arguing that the Dillard's evidence was unfair and prejudicial, and Judge Pavlikowski ultimately ruled that the jury would not hear it. Both sides were trying to bring in evidence that, as it turned out, the jury would never hear, but it later became part of the detailed records around this case. The defense wanted to expose Brady's past, while the prosecution wanted to attack Mortensen's character. The judge limited both sides, and the jury was left with what came into court two former officers, two competing accounts, eyewitnesses from the neighborhood, physical evidence from the scene, and the truck that was critical. As we noted last week, the truck was not just

described to the jury through testimony or diagrams. The jurors had the opportunity to examine it for themselves after the custom seat had been located and reinstalled. The jurors could draw their own conclusions whether Christopher Brady could have reached from the driver's side and fired a gun out the passenger window. That experience had to really solidify the testimony for the jurors. It's one thing to hear lawyers argue about the console, the bench seat, the window, and the angle of the gun. It's a whole other thing to be able to see it all with your own eyes. Could Brady have reached across Mortensen? Could he have fired out the passenger window? Could he have done all that while also controlling the truck? And could witnesses outside have

mistaken Brady's arm, Brady's gun, or Brady's movement for Mortensen's? The state argued that the answer was no. Prosecutors emphasized the ballistics testimony showing that the truck was moving while the shots were fired and that the gun had to be outside the window because otherwise the shell casings would likely have landed inside the vehicle. In closing, prosecutor Gary Geiman turned that defense theory into one pointed question. Is there something magic about Chris Brady's arm? That question summed up the state's argument in a single line. Prosecutors were asking the jury to reject Mortensen's version as too complicated, too convenient,

and too physically improbable. The state argued that the simpler explanation was the one supported by the eyewitness and gun evidence. Mortensen was the passenger. Mortensen's gun fired the shots, and Mortensen killed Daniel Mendoza. However, the defense argued that the state's version was simple only because Metro had made it simple. Kremlin told jurors that the investigation accepted Brady's statement at face value because Brady was the son of a veteran metro detective, and the police had ignored or dismissed facts that did not fit the story they wanted to believe. He pointed to Brady's

changing language about whether he stuck his gun out the window or merely pointed it across Mortensen's chest. He pointed to the eyewitnesses who never saw a second gun. He told jurors that eyewitness descriptions were imperfect, highlighting two witnesses who said the shooter wore a blue shirt, as Brady did that night. He also pointed to the route Brady took after the shooting, a trip to the ATM that Brady did not originally mention, the altered truck, the missing custom seat, and the fact that Brady's clothing had been washed before the defense had a meaningful chance to examine it for gunpowder residue or any other evidence. Each point was part of the same larger argument. Christopher Brady was not

just a witness, and definitely not a good Samaritan who came forward to do the right thing. In the defense's view, he was the person that Metro's investigators had chosen not to question hard enough. Kremlin told jurors that Christopher Brady did not tell the police the truth, and he was not telling them the truth now either. And because of that, he argued they had no choice but to acquit Ron Mortensen. In the prosecution's closing argument, they asked the jury to convict Ron Mortensen, a former police officer, a first-degree murder for five. into a group of young people while off duty, and DA Geiman acknowledged that there was something uncomfortable about that. He told jurors that people did not want to believe that a college graduate, a husband, and a father could do such terrible things. They did not want to believe law enforcement

could engage in this kind of conduct. But, he said, stranger things have happened. He said that the defense wanted the case to be about Christopher Brady, but insisted it was not. Guyman told jurors was not a case of Christopher Brady versus Ron Mortensen. It was a murder case, and he said the eyewitnesses who described Mortensen as the passenger and the shooter were the real key. During closing arguments, Guyman also showed the jury photographs of Daniel Mendoza's body and called the shooting a cold-blooded thrill kill, succinctly summing up how the state wanted jurors to understand the shooting as a deadly act of cruelty, carried out during a night that had nothing to do with Daniel, until Brady and Mortensen drove into his neighborhood.

And then, the case went to the jury. However, the photos Guyman showed did not stay inside the courtroom. The next day, the review journal published a front-page photograph of DA Gaiman holding up the autopsy photos during closing arguments. A newspaper did not publish the autopsy photos in full detail, but it had published the courtroom moment of the DA, facing the camera, holding up a photo in each hand, and the images were clear enough that the readers understood what they were seeing.

The reaction was immediate and intense. Some readers said that the image was unnecessary, disturbing, and cruel to Daniel's family, and that his death did not need to be showcased on the front page of the newspaper. Daniel had already been reduced through labels, through assumptions, through stereotypes, and through the questions of his gang ties, and sharing the photos had further robbed him of his humanity. Some readers defended the newspaper's decision, arguing that the image forced the community to confront what actually happened. One letter writer said the photo made Daniel feel real,

not just like another young man written off in the news, and that seeing his face and understanding that his future had been cut short made the violence harder to ignore. The review journal's editor himself acknowledged that some readers found the photo tasteless and that a few were angry enough to cancel their subscriptions, but he defended the decision by saying the photo captured the essence of the story. In his view, the image showed the reader, reality of a murder trial, ugly, stark, and real. As the jury began deliberating, the case moved

into a different kind of tension. Outside the courthouse, Metro was quietly preparing for the possibility that the verdict could hit the city hard. The concern was not theoretical. This case touched some of the deepest anxieties in Las Vegas, race, policing, gangs, accountability, and the fear that officers could get away with murder. Mortensen was on trial, but Brady had driven the truck and was never charged. Community activists had been demanding answers for months, and the city still remembered the unrest that followed the Rodney King verdict just a few years earlier. Police were careful in how they talked about their preparations. A police spokesperson said that Metro was prepared, but not panicked. He said they felt very confident

the community would do the right thing when the verdict came in, but he also made it clear that the department was ready. We are prepared, he said. We have a commitment to to making sure the community is safe. There were reports that Judge Pavlikowski had promised to delay reading the verdict for up to four hours to give the police time to plan and prepare. Metro denied those reports, but they also acknowledged that whatever security plan was in place could be implemented almost immediately. There was a clear sense that everyone understood how much the verdict meant and how closely the community was watching. On Wednesday, May 14, 1997, after deliberating for just a little more than a day, the jury reached its verdict.

We're going to pause here for a short break, but we'll be right back to bring you the conclusion of part four. Ron Mortensen was found guilty of first-degree murder with use of a deadly weapon. He was immediately placed into custody to await sentencing, which would begin in Judge Joseph Pavlikowski's courtroom the very next day. The verdict ended the trial, but it could never end the pain. Daniel's father, Ramon, was present as he had been throughout the trial, and after the verdict was read, he said that whatever the sentence Morton Sid would eventually serve seemed almost beside the point. No prison term could give him back his son, and Ramon told reporters that whatever time

Mortensen served will not help his grieving family. Then he said something that stays with me. Standing outside the courthouse after the verdict, Ramon said, I don't, for the rest of my life, want to come here anymore. For the court system, the verdict is the conclusion of the legal process. But for the family, it's just another day in the same loss. The jury can answer one question. It can say who the law holds responsible, but it can never undo the reason everyone was

in that courtroom in the first place. Ramon also had a message for the community that had supported his family. Ramon also had a message for the community that had supported his family. He thanked people for standing with them, and he said that people needed to learn to live in peace and love, and not in the kind of violence that had ended his son's life. Outside the courthouse, the reaction was quiet. On McKellar Circle, there was no violence, no riots, but also no celebrations or cries of victory. Columnist John L. Smith wrote that everything was quiet for now, but lingering questions about Brady cried out. He described Brady as the ultimate enigma in the case.

the officer who drove the getaway vehicle, the officer who brought the murder weapon to police after it had been under his control for nearly two days, and the officer whose brief career had raised troubling questions. One editorial praised police and prosecutors for moving quickly and without favoritism, arguing that Mortensen had been treated like a common citizen, which is exactly how it should be. Some residents in predominantly Hispanic neighborhoods said the verdict was only part of the answer. They were relieved that Morton's had been convicted, but many still questioned why Christopher Brady had never been charged. One resident asked what would have happened if two Hispanic people had been in the truck,

one had shot, and the other had driven away. Would they both have gone to jail? Those questions had existed since January, and they were still there after the verdict. Even as the verdict came down, reporters were already looking more closely at Christopher Brady's background. Right alongside the headlines declaring Mortensen guilty, their review journal was already digging into Brady's background, his credibility, and the complaints that have followed him during his time with Metro, those questions continued to grow after the verdict was announced. Next week, we turn to Brady, the driver of the truck, the state's central witness, and the former officer whose role in Daniel Mendoza's murder remained one of the most contested parts of

the case. If you're enjoying the podcast, please leave a review on whatever platform you're listening on and share the link to the show with a friend. It really helps us get the word out about the podcast, and we appreciate your support. Till next week, thank you for listening, and remember what happens here, happens everywhere. Thanks for listening. Visit sinspod.com slash subscribe for exclusive bonus content

and to listen ad-free. Remember to like and follow us on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, and threads at sins and survivors. If you're enjoying the podcast, please leave us a review on your podcast platform of choice. You can contact us at Questions at Sins and Survivors. If you or someone you know is affected by domestic violence or needs support, please reach out to local resources or the National Domestic Violence Hotline. A list of resources is available on our website, sins and survivors.com. Sins and survivors, a Las Vegas true crime podcast, is researched written and produced by your host, Sean and John. The information shared in this podcast is accurate at the time of recording. If you have questions, concerns, or corrections, please email us. Links to source material for this episode can be found on our website. Sins and Survivors.com.

The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are solely those of the podcast creators, hosts, and their guests. All individuals are innocent until proven guilty. This content does not constitute legal advice. Listeners are encouraged to consult with legal professionals for guidance.