Attorney Neil Anderson won an acquittal this week in Clark County Superior Court, sparing his client from a mandatory prison sentence that would have been handed down had he been convicted of unlawful imprisonment, a felony.

While the 12-person jury found Anderson’s client not guilty of the felony charge, it was unable to reach an verdict on a charge of misdemeanor assault. 

A deputy prosecutor told Superior Court Judge Bernard Veljacic after the verdicts was read and the jurors had left the courtroom that she’ll likely be asking for a new trial on the assault charge.

Ten of the 12 jurors stayed behind to speak to Anderson and the deputy prosecutor. They said the vote on the assault charge was 11 to 1 in favor of “not guilty.”

 

The two-day trial began Sept. 25 and jurors returned Sept. 27 to begin deliberations, which lasted approximately five hours.

The alleged victim called 911 on March 28 and claimed her child’s father wasn’t letting her leave the house. But she then told the emergency dispatcher he had left the house, and the sound of his engine could be heard in the background. She claimed he’d hit her in the face.

To give jurors an idea of the alleged victim’s credibility, Anderson called the woman’s mother as a witness for the defense. The mother testified that her daughter told her that she had made up the allegation of abuse and that she would be believed by police because she’s a woman. The mother said she asked her daughter, “Why’d you throw (him) under the bus like that?” She also said her daughter had absolutely no injuries.

In her original statement for police officers, the alleged victim claimed to have a black eye. When she testified at trial, she recanted and told jurors that she made it up because she was jealous that her child’s father had been cheating on her.

An officer wrote in his report that the woman did appear to have a swollen eye, but Anderson’s client told officers that his child’s mother has naturally puffy eyes and she has been known to put on makeup and make it appear as if she had black eyes so she could accuse him of punching her.

Had he been convicted of felony unlawful imprisonment, Anderson’s client would have been sentenced to at least two years in prison.