Yoni Barrios is a killer who went on a stabbing spree on the Las Vegas strip that left two people dead and six other injured
According to court documents Yoni Barrios, who had arrived in Nevada from California, would go on a stabbing spree attacking eight people leaving two of them dead. Barrios after he was arrested told Officers he was trying to get his anger out.
Yoni Barrios would be arrested and charged with a long list of charges however it would take a while for his case to go to trial due to his mental competency. However in the end Yoni would plead guilty to fifteen charges in order to get the death penalty taken off of the table. Barrios would be sentenced to life in prison without parole
The stabbing spree made National headlines after President Trump would use this case to point out the dangers of illegal immigrants
Yoni Barrios Case
An unauthorized immigrant from Guatemala who went on a stabbing rampage on the Las Vegas Strip in 2022 that left two people dead and injured six others, pleaded guilty but mentally ill to two counts of murder on Thursday.
The man, Yoni Barrios, 34, will serve life in prison without the possibility of parole but will avoid the death penalty, according to a copy of his plea agreement, which was reached in Clark County District Court.
His unprovoked attack on the morning of Oct. 6, 2022, provided political grist to Donald J. Trump and to a far-right nonprofit anti-immigration group. His victims included several showgirl impersonators, one of whom was killed.
Yoni Barrios pleaded guilty to a total of 15 counts, including five for attempted murder with use of a deadly weapon and one count of an act of terrorism. His formal sentencing is scheduled for March 14.
Scott L. Coffee, a public defender for Mr. Barrios, said in an interview on Thursday that his client had received a diagnosis of unspecified schizophrenia spectrum and other psychotic disorders.
“The allegations were egregious, but the state also recognized that he was somebody who was severely mentally ill,” said Mr. Coffee, who described Mr. Barrios as being “delusional” at the time of the attack.
The Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department referred questions on Thursday to the Clark County District Attorney’s Office, which did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The attack unfolded on the 3100 block of South Las Vegas Boulevard near the Wynn Las Vegas casino, where Yoni Barrios approached a group of showgirl impersonators and asked to take a picture with them, saying he was a chef, the authorities said. He appeared to be dressed in a chef’s jacket and showed them a knife before lunging at his victims, video showed. Investigators said that Mr. Barrios told them that he had snapped after some of the women laughed at him. In the video, Mr. Barrios was seen running along a sidewalk and stabbing more victims, one of them in the back.
The Clark County coroner’s office identified the victims who were killed as Maris Mareen Digiovanni, 30, a showgirl impersonator from Las Vegas, and Brent Allan Hallett, 47, who The Las Vegas Review-Journal reported was from Alberta in Canada and had been staying in the city for several months while traveling around the world.
The stabbings drew national attention from people including Mr. Trump, who brought it up during a rally for his political action committee in Nevada in October 2022, weeks before the midterm elections. Mr. Trump said Yoni Barrios had a criminal record in California but the “bloodthirsty killer was unknown to law enforcement because of California’s barbaric sanctuary city policies.”
“You can’t walk down a street in a Democrat-run city without being shot, or mugged or knifed,” he said.
Although Mr. Barrios was charged in 2019 with domestic violence stemming from a 2018 episode, according to KSNV News 3 in Las Vegas, the case was “dismissed or not prosecuted” in 2021. It was not clear why the case did not proceed.
That did not stop the group Citizens for Sanity, an anti-immigration nonprofit with ties to the America First Legal Foundation, a group formed by Stephen Miller, from running an ad during the baseball playoffs in October 2022 that called attention to the stabbings. Mr. Miller currently holds the positions of deputy White House chief of staff, with oversight of domestic policy, and homeland security adviser.
The ad was characterized as “misleading” by the group FactCheck.org, which also mentioned that there had not been a conviction in Mr. Barrios’s domestic violence case in California.
Mr. Coffee, the lawyer for Mr. Barrios, said that his client has been in the United States for more than a decade. While an initial mental competency assessment found him unfit for trial, he said, Mr. Barrios was declared competent about six weeks ago and has been receiving mental health treatment. The lawyer described the depth of Mr. Barrios’s mental illness.
“He thought he was being pursued by police from L.A.,” he said. “He thought he had been sprayed by some kind of mister that had anthrax in it.”
As part of his plea agreement, Mr. Barrios will continue to be treated for his mental illness while serving his life sentence, Mr. Coffee said. He also will be housed separately from other inmates until officials determine that it is safe for him to join the general population.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/30/us/las-vegas-stabbings-guilty-plea.html
Yoni Barrios News
A man who killed two people and injured six others during a 2022 stabbing spree on the Las Vegas Strip will spend the rest of his life behind bars.
On Wednesday, Yoni Barrios was officially sentenced after agreeing to plead guilty to 15 different counts, including an act of terrorism, murder with use of a deadly weapon, and attempted murder with use of a deadly weapon.
In January, we told you that Yoni Barrios and his attorney reached a plea deal with prosecutors in exchange for the state dropping the death penalty.
Yoni Barrios’ attorney, Scott Coffee, told me the attack was fueled by an untreated mental illness and that Barrios had been trying to get help in California, before he came to Las Vegas.
“I understand how he’s been portrayed. The fact of the matter is he was very mentally ill at the time of the offense. He’s not been a problem for the state. He’s never been a problem for me to deal with. He’s never been an issue for the courts,” Coffee said. “This incident is a tragedy and it’s definitely a call for reform. I think what the prosecution did here was tough but fair. I understand why they asked for the plea they did. I’m grateful they were willing to drop the death penalty because the mental illness was the motivating factor.”
Yoni Barrios was initially found not competent to stand trial and Coffee explained that Barrios has been getting treatment at a state facility for the past couple of years.
Now the question is if Barrios will be able to continue receiving his medication in prison.
“There have been concerns raised in court two days ago that the medication regime has changed at the detention center. That’s been an ongoing problem with cases,” Coffee said. “There’s a concern as to whether or not he’ll remain competent. I suspect that he will but it’s one of those things that we have to watch out for.”
https://www.ktnv.com/news/las-vegas-strip-stabber-sentenced-to-life-in-prison