LAS VEGAS (KLAS) — A Las Vegas man charged with a second fatal DUI had his driver’s license revoked this summer, but the Department of Motor Vehicles said police killed the man while driving under the influence of drugs. I did not process the paperwork until six days after announcing that I had , Also.
Prentiss Bates, 50, was charged with driving under the influence on September 22nd. Bates crashed into the front of a parked car and Las Vegas driver DeMar killed Sims, 40, police said. The crash occurred in a construction zone around 2am near Rancho He Drive and Craig Road in the Northwest Valley.
As first reported by 8 News Now Investigators, the crash was Bates’ second fatal DUI indictment.
“This case is the perfect storm of almost every failure of our criminal justice system combined into the nasty package of trash can fires,” prosecutor Noreen DeMonte said Thursday.
Bates pleaded guilty to death while driving under the influence of a controlled substance in 2013. Bates hit a motorcycle while he was driving in November 2012, killing its rider, records for Jim Burshett, 58, say.
Prosecutors said Bates had a high PCP at the time of the 2012 crash, as records show.
A judge sentenced Bates to eight to twenty years in prison. The judge also ordered that his vehicle be fitted with an interlock device for a minimum of three years after his release.
Records show that Bates was charged another DUI charge on June 30. A judge released him on $50,000 bail in July, pending the filing of a criminal complaint. If the complaint is not filed immediately, it is standard for the judge to release the defendant on bail. The judge also ordered him not to drive.
The Nevada Parole Board granted Bates parole in November 2020, according to eight records reviewed by News Now Investigators.
Bates said at a hearing in August 2020, “I made a bad, terrible decision to choose to drive a car under the influence.
During the hearing, members of the parole board said Bates did not attend substance abuse treatment while in custody.
“And in your history there are many drug and alcohol crimes,” a parole member said at the hearing.
“The man standing in front of you today has changed a lot,” Bates told the board.
But prosecutors say Bates hasn’t changed.
Following his June DUI conviction, proceedings were initiated to have his driver’s license revoked due to previous serious DUI charges. His DMV in Nevada said he did not receive the request until Aug. 22, his Eight News His Now investigator confirmed.
The manual process can be delayed for weeks as police await the results of blood tests. The Nevada DMV processed Bates’ revocation notice on his Sept. 28, six days after police arrested him on a second-degree DUI fatality charge, a spokesperson said. person confirmed.
“Failure. Absolutely utter failure,” said DeMonte.
A judge ordered Bates not to drive, but Demote said Bates likely would not have been able to rent the car if the revocation had been processed sooner. It was unclear whether the company from which Bates rented the car had access to electronic records.
“Certainly, he would have had that little card in his hand, but if anyone tried to run it, it could have been a car rental company and possibly pulled over by cops.
Arrested after a felony DUI conviction, Bates is in prison without bail.
