Sins & Survivors: A Las Vegas True Crime Podcast - The Murder of Daniel Mendoza - Part 8

Episode Date: August 11, 2026

In our 8th and final installment on the murder of Daniel Mendoza and the 30 years of litigation that followed, we end up, unbelievably, in 2026 with Ron Mortensen still working to relitigate the case.. will he finally be successful?For ad-free episodes, including this one, and access to our weekly bonus content head over to https://sinspod.co/subscribehttps://sinspod.co/138https://sinspod.co/129sourceshttps://sinspod.co/138transcriptBecome 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.com 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. For nearly 30 years, Ron Mortensen said the jury never heard the full story about Daniel Mendoza's murder. He said Christopher Brady had been protected by the police department and that the jury had been kept from the truth and that he was convicted as a scapegoat for failures inside Metro. Then, after decades of appeals, a federal court finally reopened the case. But what came next was not the ending Mortensen wanted, and it was not the closure that Daniel's family deserved. Hi, and welcome to Sins and Survivors, a Las Vegas true crime podcast, where we focus on missing persons, unsolved cases, and 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. This is the final episode of our eight-part series on the murder of Daniel Mendoza. Over the past two months, we have looked at the culture of Las Vegas in the 1990s and how on

December 28, 1996, two off-duty police officers drove into a low-income neighborhood and fired a gun at a group of young people who were hanging out in front of their small apartment complex. Daniel Mendoza, just 21 years old, died in front of his home. There was no evidence or testimony from either officer that the friends had done anything to provoke them. They weren't armed. They were just hanging out and celebrating during the holiday season. What followed was a trial that gripped Las Vegas as each officer blamed the other for the murder. To go back and hear everything from the beginning, visit sinspod.com slash 129, or we have put all the episodes together in a Spotify playlist for you at sinspod.co slash Daniel Mendoza. Last week we talked about the legal arguments that kept Mortensen's case alive for nearly 30 years.

Mortensen repeatedly argued that the jury had not heard the full story about Christopher Brady, about the evidence, and about the credibility issues that surrounded the state's key witness. Some of these arguments were rejected over and over again, but they didn't disappear, because neither Mortensen's nor Brady's role in Daniel's death was ever fully resolved in a way that satisfied anyone, not Daniel's family, Mortensen supporters, Metro, or the many Las Vegas residents watching the case from the outside. And then in March of 2025, one of those arguments finally broke through. U.S. District Judge Kent Dawson ruled that Mortensen was entitled to a new trial because the court bound serious constitutional problems in the original trial.

One issue involved the jury instructions used in 1997, which didn't properly separate intent from the legal requirement of deliberation in a first-degree murder case. Another involved Mark Barry, the metro officer who later said that Brady had talked before Daniel's murder about doing a drive-by, which was testimony the jury never heard. That ruling reopened the case almost 30 years after Daniel was killed, forcing state prosecutors to consider what justice could look like for a murder case from 1996. By 2025, almost 30 years had passed. Witnesses were older, memories had faded. Some people may have been difficult to find,

and physical evidence that had mattered so much during the original trial, including Brady's truck, could not simply be located or ever recreated in the same way. There were also questions about who would even testify if the case went back to trial. Would Christopher Brady take the stand again? Would Ron Mortensen? Would the eyewitnesses who had testified in 1997 still be available? And if they were, how much would they remember after nearly three decades? And if the case did go before a new jury, prosecutors would not only have to prove what happened on McKellar Circle that night, they would have to do it while carrying the weight of everything that had gone wrong, or allegedly gone wrong, the first time around, the jury instructions,

Mark Barry's testimony, questions about Brady's credibility, and all of the doubt that had been allowed to accumulate around the case for nearly 30 years. There was also the practical question of sentencing. Clark County District Attorney Steve Wolfson told the review journal, the prosecutors did not believe Mortensen would receive life without parole again if he were retried. Instead, they believed that if he were convicted again, he would likely receive a sentence that made him immediately eligible for parole. So the state was facing a narrow and challenging path. They could retry Mortensen and ask Daniel's loved ones to live through another painful trial, knowing there was a real possibility that the prosecutors could lose outright.

and be left with no conviction at all. Or they could win, but still end up in roughly the same place, with Mortensen eligible for release because he had already served nearly 30 years. That was the brutal reality of the case in 2025, so prosecutors had to decide whether to keep fighting for the original conviction or make a plea deal that preserved legal responsibility for Daniel's death, even if it would never feel like justice. For Mortensen, the choice was Justice Stark, but for a very different reason.

he could reject a deal, roll the dice on a new trial, and risk spending the rest of his life in prison, or he could accept a deal for lesser charges and walk out of prison after almost three decades. Mortensen was apparently open to the deal, but he did not want to make a full confession. He wanted an Alford plea, which would have allowed him to accept the legal consequences while still maintaining his innocence, essentially telling the court that he was not admitting he killed Daniel, but he understood that a jury might convict him. the state refused. And on July 1st, 2025, after decades of insisting that Christopher Brady was the shooter, after 30 years of writing letters, filing appeals, claiming that Metro protected Brady because of Brady's family connections, and claiming he was a Metro political prisoner, Ron Mortensen, pleaded guilty

to second-degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder. The judge imposed a sentence of 14 to 35 years, backdated to 1997. After half a lifetime in prison, Ron Mortensen was a free man. We're going to pause here for our first break, but when we come back, we'll talk about why even that plea didn't end the case. Usually this is where the episode would end. And when I first started on this series, I fully expected it would have ended here as well. There was never going to be a satisfying ending, not for Daniel's family, not for people who believe Mortensen should have served every day of his original life sentence, and not for people who believed Christopher Brady should have faced felony charges, too. But the story would have reached its conclusion, except Mortensen did not leave it there.

In May 2026, right when I was beginning my research into this case, and less than a year after he entered the plea that allowed him to leave prison, Mortensen filed a motion to withdraw it. He has argued that his plea was not entered into knowingly, voluntarily, or intelligently. Then, in his plea, In June, just as the first episodes were coming out, he filed a supplemental motion based on what he called newly discovered evidence. He has claimed there were problems with his attorney, that he was pressured, and that cognitive impairment, mental health issues, and brain injuries affected his ability to enter the plea. He also argued that his attorney didn't properly investigate or explain evidence involving Christopher Brady, impeachment material, and other issues from the old case. impeachment material would be evidence raised that would have called a witness's credibility into question, for example, past criminal history of a witness or prior inconsistent statements.

The state's response to his motion was essentially no. The state argued that Mortensen signed a guilty plea agreement saying he understood the charges, had discussed possible defenses with his attorney, believed the plea was in his best interest, wasn't being coerced, and was satisfied with his lawyer. the state also pointed to the plea hearing itself. According to the state, during the hearing, the judge asked Mortensen whether he understood what was happening, whether anyone had forced or threatened him,

whether any promises had been made outside of the plea agreement, whether he had gone over the plea agreement with his attorney, and whether he had any questions or concerns before the plea was accepted. And Mortensen's answers, according to the state, showed that he understood the plea and entered it voluntarily. The state also explained that Mortensen wanted an Alfred plea, but when the state rejected it, his attorney told the court that even without the Alfred language, Mortensen still wanted to accept the offer and waive defects so he could get out of prison.

During the hearing, the judge asked Mortensen if that was true, and Mortensen said yes. According to the state, Mortensen knew what he was doing, knew this wasn't an Alford plea, knew the deal required an actual guilty plea, and accepted it because it allowed. him to get out of prison. Now that he had received the benefit of the deal, the state said he should not be able to come back and argue that the plea should not count. But that's not all. If you look at the court docket from July into early August of 2006, it's filled with notices, objections, emergency motions, amended motions, requests for clarification, arguments about attorney representation, complaints about judicial conduct, and filings about whether the judge

herself should be disqualified, all filed by Mortensen. By our count between July 2nd and August 5th alone, Mortensen filed 14 separate documents, which is a lot of work for a man who has already pleaded guilty, received time served, and walked out of prison. It feels like Ron Mortensen is trying to litigate the entire history of his case all over again, one court filing at a time. One of the many documents he filed in July includes a sworn affidavit seeking to disqualify district judge Jacqueline Bluth, who had presided over his 2025 plea and sentencing. His argument in broad terms was that Judge Bluth should not be the person deciding these post-conviction issues because her own conduct, communications, and handling of the case had now become part of what he was challenging. He alleged that she is not impartial because of what he described as communication or communication. coordination between her law enforcement leadership and the prosecution around the time of his plea

agreement. He also pointed to a June 26 event where court staff contacted the district attorney's office about whether or not the state intended to oppose his filing. The state said it had not received notice. The state was then given more time to respond and Mortensen said he was only notified after the continuance had already been issued. To Mortensen, that was not just a scheduling issue or common courtesy. It was part of a pattern that made him believe that the state had received one-sided procedural access, while his own issues with service, counsel, and access to the court remained unresolved. Judge Bluth's answer rejected all that.

Judge Bluth said, Neither ground satisfied the legal standard for disqualification. She wrote that the ultimate question was whether she had acted with bias, and that bias in her answer, was non-existent. At most, Mortensen had shown a disagreement with her rulings, complaints about procedure, and a chain of suspicions that were not enough to remove the judge from the case. Even now, it feels like this case keeps widening. What began as a motion to withdraw a guilty plea has now become a fight about counsel, service, disability access, and whether the judge herself can fairly decide the case. And then, layered on top of that, Mortensen also submitted

what he described as newly discovered evidence, which included an affidavit from an attorney who said that he had attended parts of Mortensen's 1996 trial and had reviewed the transcripts and records related to his plea. The affidavit is worth mentioning, in my opinion, because it shows the kind of narrative Mortensen is still trying to build. This attorney described old concerns about Brady, the firearms testimony, the handling of evidence, and what he called a Brady blackout, suggesting that Brady's memory loss after the shooting looked suspiciously convenient. This attorney also argued that the 2025 plea transcript raised questions about whether Mortensen had enough opportunity to confer with his lawyer after the state refused to allow an

Alford plea. He described Mortensen as a former Army officer, a person with professional and social connections in the community, an athlete, a college graduate, a husband, a father, a father, a officer. a homeowner, a disabled veteran, and someone who, in this attorney's view, adhered to extremely high moral standards. All in all, this strikes me as kind of odd. You don't usually have an attorney offer a sworn affidavit to the court regarding their own opinions on a case. As far as I know, he is not acting as Mortensen's attorney. I want to note that we do not have the budget to purchase every document filed in this case. I am just sharing information that we were

able to obtain. Some of Mortensen's filings are 80 pages long or more, and just aren't something we can get our hands on. It strikes me that nearly 30 years after Daniel Mendoza was killed, Mortensen's argument is still not necessarily a legal argument. It's an argument about his reputation. He is still trying to separate himself from the image of the off-duty officer in the passenger seat of Brady's truck, still trying to present himself as the kind of man who could not have done what the jury said he did, and still trying to pull the case back toward Christopher Brady, Metro, and the failures of everyone around him. The state has argued that the plea was voluntary, that his current claims are contradicted

by the record, and that he accepted the deal because it allowed him to leave prison. Judge Bluth has rejected the idea that Mortensen's allegations show she is biased, but his tenacity for the last three decades is exactly why this case is not yet finished. Even after the conviction was overturned and he walked free, he's still litigating not only what happened in 2025 with his voluntary guilty plea, but also what happened that night in 1996, what happened during the trial in 1997, and also what happened in the decades of appeals after that. He's seeking relief from a system when it's obvious he doesn't trust that system in the first place. As we record this, Mortensen's hearing on the matter is scheduled for August 25, 2006, in just about two weeks. but he could file new documents this week or there could be a continuance. I get the feeling there could be an update coming next season on this one, but for now,

this is where the case still sits. Mortensen has taken up a lot of space in this story. His trial, his appeals, his letters to the RJ, his scandal involving his grandmother, and now his newest motions. But this series wasn't really about Ron Mortensen. It was about what happened to Daniel Mendoza, and it was about what happened to Las Vegas after Daniel was killed. We're going to pause here with another quick break, but we'll be right back to talk about Daniel and the impact his murder left on Las Vegas.

Metro is not the same department it was in 1996. There has been more training, more public scrutiny, more language around accountability, more diversity inside the department, and more formal review of police use of force. But that does not mean the deeper issues have ever gone away. In 2020, during the George Floyd protests in downtown Las Vegas, Jorge Gomez, a young Latino man, was shot and killed by metro officers near the federal courthouse. Police said Gomez was armed and that the officers perceived a threat. But his family continued to fight for accountability. And after criminal charges were not filed, they pursued the case in civil court. Years later, a federal jury awarded his family $6.5 million.

Like in Daniel's case, civil court has often become the place where families go when the criminal system does not give them the answers or accountability they hoped for. A civil case can force testimony, bring records into public view, and give a family some measure of validation that something went terribly wrong. But it still cannot bring someone back. It cannot fully answer why a young man is dead while the people who killed him remain outside of the criminal system. And then there is Brandon Durham, whose story we covered in episode 55. and whose death is one of the most devastating recent examples of this same unresolved question. In November of 2004, Brandon Durham, a black man, called 911 because someone had broken into his home. When Officer Alexander Bookman entered the house, Brandon was struggling with the intruder over a knife,

and within seconds, Bookman had shot Durham, not the intruder. The person who called for help became the person who died. The Durham case was unusual because the Clark County District Attorney's Office did not simply decline charges and close the book. D.A. Steve Wilson said he and senior attorneys believed there were reasonable grounds to think Bookmen may have had criminal liability because the use of force may have been objectively unreasonable, and the case was presented to a grand jury. The grand jury returned a no true bill, meaning there would be no indictment, no criminal trial, and because grand jury presented. proceedings are secret, no full public view of the evidence, testimony, arguments, or reasoning behind the outcome. Then, as we were finishing this series, local news reported that Bookman was no longer with Metro. His attorney said that Bookman had been eligible to return to duty,

but chose to resign, while News 3 reported that Metro listed the resignation as effective months earlier in March. So, yes, Las Vegas changed after Daniel Mendoza, but when you look at George Gomez, when you look at Brandon Durham, when you listen again to Ramon Mendoza saying that years after Daniel's death that everything felt the same, it's hard to say that the underlying issue disappeared. And those are only two names. Las Vegas has heard this question in other cases too. You see it in 2017 where Tashi Brown ran to the police for protection during a panic attack, only to take his last breath and a chokehold. You see it in 2019 with Roy Scott, whose frantic call for help. became fatal when he ended up forced to the ground by the officers and lost consciousness and later died.

And with Byron Williams, who was stopped before sunrise for riding a bicycle without lights, handcuffed on the ground, and told officers 17 times he could not breathe before he became unresponsive and died. Then in 2020, when 12-year-old Joseph, who was killed, while being held hostage in a vehicle when Henderson officers opened fire during the attempted rescue. And you also see it in 2026. with little three-year-old Kentray also murdered during a hostage call and whose family was also left asking why a rescue operation had ended in gunfire. Different years, different names, different facts.

But the same question keeps surfacing in Las Vegas. When police power turns deadly, who gets answers, who gets accountability, and who is asked to accept the official story and move on? Because before the multimillion dollar lawsuits, before the body cameras, before the public reports, before the review boards and the watchdogs, there was a quiet cul-de-sac off university in paradise called McKellar Circle. In the first hours after Daniel was killed,

Ramon didn't see a system rushing to protect his family. He saw police photographing Daniel's grieving friends. He saw suspicion turned toward the young men mourning outside the apartment complex. He saw the label of gang member begin to crowd out the fact that Daniel had been a person. And he asked the question that has stayed with this case from the beginning. Why do you do nothing when my son? son is shot. Daniel Mendoza was killed in a city that was booming too fast to see everyone clearly. Vegas in the 1990s was selling itself as a dream machine, with new casinos, new neighborhoods,

new money, and new people arriving every day. But just off the strip in the neighborhoods tourists never saw, Daniel's community was treated less like a part of the city's future and more like a problem to control. After Daniel died, people argued over what exactly he was. A victim, a gang member, a symbol, a warning, a reason to reform Metro, a reason to defend Metro, a name and a trial, a lawsuit, a federal appeal, and a police oversight debate. We would remind you that he was just 21 years old. He worked at a Carl's Jr. and a coffee shop near UNLV. He was engaged. His mother died when he was a teenager, and his father, Ramon, worked overnight waxing floors and raised his children as a single parent. Daniel had plans. He wanted to save money. He wanted a home. He wanted a family.

His father called him a dreamer, a young man full of hopes and illusions, and that is one of the cruelest parts of this story, because the legal system has spent decades arguing about Ron Mortensen, what he knew, what he intended, what the jury should have heard, what Brady claimed, what Mark Barry knew, and so on. But Daniel only got one life. It was a life that ended in seconds outside his home on McKellar Circle, because two police officers decided his neighborhood was a place they could terrorize for fun. Ramon Mendoza never had the luxury of treating this case as an abstract legal problem. He had to watch strangers argue over whether Daniel was worthy of sympathy, and listen as the case became a debate about police, gangs, race, evidence, credibility, and public order.

Still, Ramon never gave up having hope that Las Vegas could change for the better. He invited officers over to his home and showed them Daniel's photos. He sued. He spoke out. It's painful to acknowledge that even years later, after the trials, after Brady's federal plea, after Metro said changes had been made, Ramon was still saying that everything felt the same. And Las Vegas is still asking what accountability means

when the people sworn to protect the community are the danger itself. So this is where we leave this story. There is no clean ending, with Mortensen's hearing still pending, but we want to close with Daniel, a son, a brother, a fiance, a friend, and a young man standing outside his home three days after Christmas. If this case changed Las Vegas, it's because Daniel's family and his community refused to let Las Vegas look away. They refused to let Daniel be reduced to a label, and they refused to let this city treat his death as just another violent night in a neighborhood people had already decided not to care about. We leave you with the dreamer and the dream that someday no family will have to fight this hard to prove that their son mattered.

Because 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.com. 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 research 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.

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