LAS VEGAS — One of two teenagers charged with murder in the fatal video-recorded crash of an allegedly stolen car into a bicyclist in Las Vegas last year has been found unfit to stand trial next month.
Court records showed Thursday that a state court judge on Wednesday ordered the teen, now 19, moved from jail in Las Vegas to a secure Nevada psychiatric facility for evaluation, treatment and possible trial if he is found competent. The commitment order suspends criminal charges against him.
His court-appointed public defender, David Westbrook, did not respond Thursday to messages about the case.
The teen and a younger co-defendant, also male, each pleaded not guilty last year to murder and other felony charges alleging they acted together in a series of car thefts and hit-and-run vehicle incidents in August 2023, including the apparently intentional striking of a bicyclist on a quiet northwest Las Vegas street.
The Associated Press is not naming the defendants due to their ages at the time of the alleged crimes.
According to police, the teenagers earlier stole a vehicle, struck a 72-year-old bicyclist with it, and drove away. That man reported knee pain but was not hospitalized.
The bicyclist who died was Andreas ''Andy'' Probst, 64, a retired former police chief in the city of Bell, outside Los Angeles. His family said he was on a recreational bike ride when video showed he was struck from behind and left fatally injured on the side of the road.
Cellphone video, shot from the front passenger seat of an allegedly stolen vehicle, circulated widely on the internet before Las Vegas police found and arrested the teens.
