Published Tuesday, April 2, 2019 | 10:18 a.m.
Updated Tuesday, April 2, 2019 | 11:02 a.m.
Suse Antunez-Garcia
A store clerk accused of fatally shooting a beer thief outside as he ran from a Las Vegas convenience store will be freed on house arrest and electronic monitoring pending her next court hearing, a judge said Tuesday.
Suse J. Antunez-Garcia stood in shackles with her assigned defense attorney, JoNell Thomas, and was not asked to enter a plea to a felony murder charge in the killing of Robert Lee Cook.
Las Vegas Justice of the Peace Joe M. Bonaventure said Antunez-Garcia can be freed on $10,000 bail and restrictions and scheduled a May 1 preliminary hearing to determine if the case should be tried in state court.
Thomas declined outside court to comment.
Antunez-Garcia, 26, followed Cook and a woman outside a downtown store where they scuffled with a store manager after taking several cases of beer, and shot Cook as he got in a vehicle, police said.
Cook, 56, was pronounced dead at a hospital of multiple gunshots. The coroner ruled his death a homicide. The woman has not been identified.
Clark County District Attorney Steve Wolfson told KLAS-TV that Antunez-Garcia's actions do not appear to constitute self-defense because there was no indication Cook was armed or posed a significant threat to her or someone else.
Wolfson did not immediately respond to messages from The Associated Press.
The prosecutor said people can use deadly force to defend themselves or others only if they have a reasonable fear of serious injury or death.
In a similar shooting that did not result in death, a 56-year-old store clerk was sentenced in 2015 to four to 12 years in prison for shooting a man in the back of the head when he tried to steal a case of beer in 2014.
A jury in Las Vegas found Mariano Tejeda-Zuniga guilty of battery with a deadly weapon and possession of a stolen gun but acquitted him of attempted murder.
Last year, a Las Vegas smoke shop clerk was sentenced to three years' probation for shooting a masked but unarmed 13-year-old boy to death in an apparent grab-and-run theft in December 2016.
Raad Sunna was originally charged with murder but pleaded guilty to one misdemeanor count of aiming a firearm at a person.
