LAS VEGAS (AP) - Two teenagers were sentenced Tuesday to 20 years to life in prison for killing a 17-year-old high school junior during a June 2018 party at an abandoned house in suburban Henderson.
The Las Vegas Review-Journal reports that Clark County District Court Judge Douglas Herndon called it “mind-boggling” that no one called 911 after Matthew Minkler was shot.
A jury heard in July that Jaiden Caruso shared an internet video of the body in a pool of blood, Kody Harlan took cash from Minkler’s pockets, and the two later returned to the house to clean up the scene and try to hide Minkler’s body in a closet.
Caruso, who was 16 at the time, bragged on the internet that he “just caught a body.”
His lawyer, Mace Yampolsky, told jurors during trial that Caruso was under the influence of drugs and alcohol at the time.
Caruso apologized at sentencing and told Minkler’s parents there had been no plan to hurt their son.
Harlan, then 17, argued that he was asleep on a couch when Caruso killed Minkler, and insisted he should not have been tried on a murder charge.
The judge noted the jury found both teens guilty of murder and armed robbery. Harlan also was convicted of being an accessory to murder.
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