LAS VEGAS – A Las Vegas-area teenager is due to face a judge for the first time Monday in the butcher knife slayings of his mother and younger brother a day after police say they celebrated his 16th birthday.
Adrian Navarro-Canales is due in Henderson Justice Court. He is being prosecuted as an adult in the double slaying that came to light Sept. 20, when Henderson police found the bodies of Elvira Canales-Gomez and 9-year-old Cesar Navarro in the bathroom of their apartment.
Police say the mom had multiple stab wounds and a knife in her chest. The boy was stabbed once in the chest.
Navarro-Canales was sought for several days in the U.S. and along the Mexican border before he was found last Wednesday sitting alone at a food court on the Las Vegas Strip. The spot is about 9 miles from the suburban apartment where he lived with his mother and brother.
Police think the killings happened Sept. 17, sometime after the mom picked Cesar up from school.
Navarro-Canales was initially named as a possible victim, not a suspect. The Associated Press typically doesn't identify minors accused of crimes but is naming Navarro-Canales because of the seriousness of the crime.
Officers went to the apartment once Sept. 18 and twice Sept. 19 at the request of a relative and a friend before entering and finding the bodies during a fourth visit.
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