Friday, Sept. 26, 2003 | 11:03 a.m.
Metro Police have filed murder charges Thursday against the mother accused of killing her two children with a baseball bat and may face the death penalty if convicted, authorities said.
The mother, Sylvia Ewing, continues recovering from injuries she received when she stepped in front of a tractor-trailer in an apparent suicide attempt after allegedly beating to death her children, Phillip, 8, and Julie, 4.
Metro Police Lt. Tom Monahan said Thursday that Ewing was "booked in absentia" Thursday evening and has a guard standing watch outside her hospital room.
She will be taken to Clark County Detention Center when she is released from the hospital.
Ewing was listed in fair condition Thursday afternoon, a marked upgrade since Wednesday morning when she was considered to be in critical condition, University Medical Center spokeswoman Cheryl Persinger said. Ewing was conscious but remained in the trauma and intensive care unit at UMC Thursday afternoon.
Clark County District Attorney David Roger said Ewing's alleged actions make her eligible for the death penalty because the victims are under 14 years old and because there is more than one victim.
"But it's our policy to wait until after the preliminary hearing or the arraignment to consider whether we will seek that option," Roger said.
The district attorney's office has a six-person panel, including Roger, the assistant district attorney and law enforcement leaders, which meets to consider whether the death penalty will be sought at trial.
Clark County Coroner Mike Murphy confirmed Thursday what police have been saying since Tuesday, that the children were both killed by multiple blows to the head.
The deaths were both "immediate or close to it," Murphy said. Police have said the children did not appear to have any warning of the attack, as evidence does not indicate they tried to flee or fight back.
The children's bodies were moved to Palm Mortuary Thursday. A mortuary manager and family friend said no funeral services have been scheduled yet.
Yvette Weigold, who was godmother to the two children and lived across the street from the Ewings for about five years, said neither she nor Ewing's husband, Daryl, or anyone else she knows has tried to visit Sylvia Ewing in the hospital.
Weigold and other former friends and neighbors said Sylvia Ewing suffered from depression, and was prescribed anti-depressant medication after an April 2002 episode in which Ewing was on her front lawn screaming before dawn.
North Las Vegas Police spokesman Justin Roberts said police went to the Ewing home around 4:55 a.m. on April 24, 2002 in response to complaints of a female screaming in the front yard.
Sylvia Ewing, whom Weigold said will be 40 in November, spent either a few days or a week in a hospital after that episode, Weigold and others said.
The friends and former neighbors also said Ewing seemed well most of the time since then. They lived in a quiet and friendly North Las Vegas neighborhood near the intersection of Ann Road and Coleman Street, where the Ewing children had many friends and the families often got together to talk or lend a hand.
However, Weigold said Daryl Ewing told her that Sylvia Ewing stopped taking her medication before bringing the children to visit relatives in her native Philippines in July.
Weigold said when Ewing did not take her medication she would slip into depression, and let her children play outside while she stayed in bed.
The Ewings were planning to move into a new and larger home soon. But the new house wasn't finished when Sylvia Ewing and the children returned from the Philippines earlier this month, so they moved into a one-bedroom apartment in the Emerald Suites on Las Vegas Boulevard North across from an entrance to Nellis Air Force Base.
According to police, about an hour after Daryl Ewing went to work at 2:30 a.m. Tuesday, Sylvia Ewing woke her children and brought them to a nearby Wal-Mart where she bought a baseball bat.
Then at 8:30 a.m. Ewing walked from the apartment to Las Vegas Boulevard where she stepped in front of an oncoming truck.
Daryl Ewing, a truck driver, found his children when he returned home from work around 3:30 p.m. that day, police said.
Police said a note apparently left by Sylvia Ewing led them to conclude she killed her children.
Weigold said Daryl Ewing first thought his children were sleeping, but realized what had happened after he found the note.
Sun reporter
Erin Neff contributed to this story.
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