Wednesday, Oct. 25, 2000 | 11:24 a.m.
Henderson Police Chief Michael Mayberry says he is confident prosecutors can win convictions against two suspects in the March killing of two armored-car guards.
Henderson Police will initiate the prosecution today when they turn over the voluminous case file to the district attorney's office.
Thousands of pages in the case file detail the evidence a team of detectives has been compiling since June against Jose Vigoa, 41, and Luis Suarez, 36. A third suspect in the case, Oscar Sanchez, 23, committed suicide in his Clark County jail cell Oct. 7.
"I believe we absolutely have the people involved in this crime," Mayberry said. "Based on the evidence we have uncovered, I am confident we will get convictions."
Deputy District Attorney Frank Coumou, who is prosecuting the case, said he will likely take the homicide charge to a grand jury when police finished their investigation.
During the March 3 armored-car robbery outside the Ross Dress for Less in Henderson, two guards -- Richard Sosa, 47, and Gary Prestidge II, 23 -- were gunned down.
Mayberry would not detail the evidence that links the three men to the slayings, but sources have previously told the Sun that Sanchez confessed to the crime and implicated the other two men after he and Vigoa were arrested in June in connection with the robbery of the Bellagio hotel- casino.
The three men became suspects in the armored truck robbery after a video camera recorded the robbery at the Bellagio on June 3. A federal parole officer saw the video while watching television news and recognized Vigoa, whose parole he was supervising.
That tip led to the arrest of Vigoa and Sanchez and to a weapon used in the botched armored-car holdup outside the Desert Inn in June 1999. That weapon was also tied to the Henderson slayings, Mayberry said.
After the initial arrests, a task force of two Henderson Police detectives, two Metro Police robbery detectives and two FBI was formed and started chasing down leads.
For months, Vigoa and Sanchez -- and later Suarez, who was also charged in August with the Bellagio robbery -- were called suspects in the Henderson slayings, but never booked on homicide charges.
"I would say we had the probable cause for an arrest (months ago), but once they were charged with the Bellagio robbery and weren't going anywhere, there was no need to hurry," Mayberry said.
After Vigoa and Sanchez were arrested in June, police say, more physical evidence was collected. Through DNA testing, Sanchez's blood was found at the scene and in a discarded getaway car. Sanchez also had a gunshot wound in his leg. Prestidge apparently shot one of the robbers before he was killed.
There were 51 people who claimed to have seen at least part of the robbery and shootout. Detectives took statements from all those people and started piecing together what happened that morning.
Mayberry said two of the men waited in stolen minivans for the armored truck to arrive while a third robber was sitting in a getaway car nearby. Prestidge was confronted by masked robbers with assault rifles. A gunfight started with Prestidge being shot and killed near the truck. Sosa was gunned down while still sitting behind the armored truck's wheel.
The three robbers fled in the getaway car to the rear of the Galleria at Sunset mall, where another getaway car was waiting.
Mayberry said prosecutors may need up to a week to go through all the evidence. He said submitting the case to the district attorney does not end the matter for his detectives.
"This case will not be over for us until we have a conviction in court," he said.
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