Senior homicide rate not growing

The violent deaths of six senior citizens in recent weeks, although carrying a powerful emotional impact, does not indicate a particular trend in crime, Metro Police say.

Since the year began, at least six people in the 60-plus age group have been listed in Metro's 1998 homicide log. Metro Police have investigated a total of 55 homicides this year.

But police say those numbers don't deviate significantly from long-term statistics. Elderly people make up 10 percent of the Las Vegas Valley's homicide victims, a figure police say remains roughly consistent year after year.

"It grabs the public's attention and our attention when a senior citizen is murdered, often because the elderly are so much more vulnerable," homicide Lt. Wayne Petersen said. "It's also caught our attention this year with a couple of them murdered fairly close together."

But the lieutenant maintained that, outside of two senior-citizen murders that occurred on the same weekend at the same retirement community, there is little chance of the various crimes being linked other than by age coincidence.

Among the senior-citizen murder cases police have encountered this year are:

BULLET Vela Lidner, 76, was found strangled June 30 in her Glendale Circle home, near Jones Boulevard and Alta Drive. Based upon evidence at the scene, police speculate that Lidner could have interrupted a burglar moments before she was killed.

Lidner had been away from home for about two months undergoing hip-replacement surgery and had returned home from the hospital the night before she was killed, Petersen said. She lived alone.

Officers from Metro's Northwest Area Command were going door-to-door this week questioning neighbors in hopes of finding clues to the killer's identity. The special effort was made after police learned that a break-in occurred two weeks ago in the immediate vicinity of Lidner's home.

BULLET The body of Samuel Patterniti, 64, was found June 27 beneath a pile of rocks in a wash off Centennial Parkway in the northwest valley. A bicyclist made the discovery and alerted police.

Patterniti had been reported missing by his family June 24 when he failed to return home the night before after heading out about 10 p.m. to a Rite Aid drug store near Decatur and Lake Mead boulevards. Police recovered his car at Lake Mead and Jones boulevards a few days after Patterniti's body was found. A reward of $5,000 has been offered for information leading to the killer's arrest and conviction.

BULLET Thomas Kaine, 63, a retired Army veteran, was fatally shot about 9:50 p.m. June 7 outside his apartment at the Carefree Sandhill Apartments in the 3200 block of South Sandhill Road. Kaine and his wife had returned home moments before the shooting, and his wife was heading upstairs to their unit when she heard her husband arguing with someone and heard the shots. The gunman remains at large.

BULLET Police believe a single killer was at work late May 15 or early May 16 when Wallace Siegel, 75, and Helen Sabraw, 86, were killed inside their apartments at the AmeriPark Lodges retirement facility at 4255 S. Spencer St.

Siegel lived on the first floor. His son found his body May 16 about 5 a.m. when he returned home to his father's apartment. The two had begun sharing the dwelling a few months earlier as the elder Siegel recovered from a broken hip.

Sabraw's beaten body was found by her son who stopped by her second floor apartment to visit May 17.

BULLET William L. Sherwood, 57, remains jailed at Clark County Detention Center on murder and arson charges for allegedly starting a fire May 15 in the rear bedroom of their home that killed his 68-year-old wife, Jackie B. Sherwood.

Metro averages a 65 percent to 70 percent closure rate on its murder cases, and the frequency with which it solves senior-related homicides is no different, Petersen said.

"You think people live a long, fruitful, productive life and then die such violent deaths," Petersen said. "It's very sad."

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